


Got a Taste for the Cherry, I Just Need to Take a Bite

by dynamicsymmetry



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Angst, Bisexuality, Blow Jobs, Couch Sex, Cunnilingus, Demisexuality, Developing Relationship, Dirty Talk, Face-Fucking, Facials, Fingerfucking, First Time, Hand Jobs, Multi, Mutual Masturbation, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Polyamory, Porn with Feelings, Rain Sex, Rough Sex, Season/Series 03, Season/Series 04, Sexual Fantasy, Smut, Snowballing, Threesome - F/M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-06
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2018-07-21 20:06:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 77,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7402015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dynamicsymmetry/pseuds/dynamicsymmetry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rick Grimes doesn't think about how he doesn't get laid anymore. Then there's Beth Greene, a sundress, a rainstorm, and he can't think about anything else. It's pretty much all downhill from there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I just wanted to write some porn. You know? I finished _Everything Where it Belongs_ and I just wanted to write some motherfucking porn. 
> 
> Next chapter is where the Brickyl starts. As usual this whole mess is all Mollie/Schwoozie's fault, because she showed me [this.](http://theromanticdeviant.tumblr.com/post/146756824193/myredbike-she-looks-so-pretty-in-a-summer) And also she's her.

Rick doesn't think about the fact that he's not getting laid anymore.

Doesn’t think about it much, anyway. It's simply not a factor. He's busy. Lot to do, lot to plan and deal with and build. Structures to construct, fields to hoe and seed, runs to help organize, watch shifts, the storage and distribution of supplies. And even if he's starting to quietly slip onto the sidelines when it comes to a lot of that, making room for the newly established and so far successful experiment that is the council, it's still not like he's not involved. Besides, got kids to wrangle. Not like he's ever bored. Not like he's ever idle. Not like he doesn't sleep most of the nights through, heavily and deep, and though his dreams aren't exactly fun, they also aren't exactly the kinds of dreams that push your thoughts in the direction of your own dick.

The truth is that he's desperate for distractions. Desperate not to think at all. About it. About _her._ It's better. Put it away. Move on and keep moving. He likes to think she would want that.

Toys with his wedding ring sometimes and holy God, he needs to believe that she would want that.

Not like there's really anyone around who presents a possible opportunity for it, even if he was interested. Because okay, once or twice he's played around with the idea, just for the sake of thinking about the very real fact of a future, and he's come up empty. He knows the kind of shit Shane would give him if it was all those years ago and none of what happened since ever happened - _there's pussy around, don’t have to make some kind of big commitment, don’t have to be scared, Christ, just find some piece of tail willing to spread her legs and go to town. Get your goddamn rocks off, you’ll feel better about everything._

He doesn't want to know that. He doesn't want to think about that. He wants to think about that basically least of all.

He doesn't want _pussy._

What he wants is to be out in the new soft fields with that new soft soil on his hands, smell of it in the sun and everything it means, gripping a hoe and making it softer. Welcoming. Coaxing it open for him. Gentle warmth of an afternoon in early summer. Clouds rolling in, but that's fine, more than fine; rain is good. Rain is something they need to make this work, and he pauses and straightens up, smells the impending wet and the thin whiff of ozone, and it occurs to him that maybe he should get back inside, watching the others in the yard drifting toward the doors.

And then the sky opens up on him and it doesn't much matter anymore.

It doesn't begin softly. There's no gentle spatter and a gradually increasing intensity. There's nothing and then there's a torrent of great fat drops and he's soaked with it in seconds, hair plastered to his brow and temples and shirt stuck to his skin. No reason to run now. He stands for a moment and tilts his head back and lets it bathe his face and his body, wash his hands clean as he spreads them, a hundred warm fingertips tapping against him and gliding down him In trickles and rivers. Shaking himself a bit like a dog. Smiling at it. Feeling good.

Rubbing the water out of his eyes, and there she is.

She doesn't wear dresses much, Beth. He thinks he can probably count the number of times he's seen her wearing a dress on one hand. It's not so much that she might not be the kind of girl who wears dresses, but hardly anyone does. They're wildly impractical. Purposeless. You can't work effectively in one. You can't run as fast as you might need to. There's no reason to do it.

Except he knows, as he gazes at her standing there in a sleeveless knee-length sundress, all white and yellow flowers, that she never needs a reason for pretty things.

She's practical. But she also indulges herself.

The dress is pretty, yes. It's also soaked and clinging to her and he can't _not_ see her and see everything that includes: her lean body, strong legs and arms, the small but full curve of her ass, those tiny little tits that Shane almost certainly would have scoffed at - which now he can't imagine doing. Graceful column of her neck, her head tipped back like how his was. Hair in dark gold tangles all around her shoulders and that lovely throat. Eyes closed, those long lashes - shit, even yards away he can see them. Her sweet mouth pulled into a smile as she luxuriates in the rain.

Rick doesn't think about the fact that he's not getting laid anymore. Except now that's all he's thinking about.

He's so fucking _hard,_ so hard it _hurts_ , jammed against his zipper with his mouth dry in the midst of a flood. She's not looking at him so he can stare all he wants - stare at those tits and imagine his hands on them, squeezing her so hard she wriggles and whimpers against him, mouth on the arch of her throat and scraping his teeth over her soft skin, gripping her waist, her hips, making her _feel_ how hard she's made him. Seizing her hand and making her cup him, trace his length through his jeans. Biting her lips - he would be careful with her but she's so small and so delicate and he's never had anything like her, and she's _right there._

_Pussy._

She's a teenager. He's standing here in the rain, where anyone can see, and he's having an abrupt and borderline violently intense sexual fantasy about a goddamn teenager.

And it's not sweet and light, not like how she looks. How she _is._ It's as if something dark and thick has broken loose and surged up in him, something locked away for a long fucking time, and he stares at how she looks and how she is, and he wants to fuck her up. He wants to jerk her head back, muss her hair, make her sob. Hold her down, force her open and plumb the depths of her wet pussy. Show her how much she wants it. Take all that delicate prettiness and ruin it and, in the process, make her even prettier.

He wants to fuck Beth Greene until she's screaming his name.

The lightning crashes over him and he's certain it's possessed him.

He's striding toward her before he can stop himself, ignoring his erection, ignoring worries of how visible it might be. She's lowering her head and pushing her dripping hair out of her eyes, blinking at him with that smile still curling her lips, opening her mouth to speak. He already hears that pretty voice - _Rick, wow, we should go inside, shouldn't we_ \- and she freezes.

He's close enough to touch her. Breathing hard. Her eyes slip from his face down his body and halt at his groin, and her lips tremble.

He's not going to make her do anything, God, no way is he ever doing that, but _fuck._

She looks back up at him, eyes wide as her tongue sweeps across those quivering lips. He thinks about the delightful innocence of Good Girls. He thinks about Hershel. He thinks about how fucked up he is, and he thinks about how he had no real idea he was capable of this, and he thinks very briefly about how he doesn't at all care.

For a fraction of a second he's sure that she's going to turn tail and run.

Then she takes a deep breath and a step toward him, and she reaches down for his hand.

As with the rain, there's no transition. There's her fingers brushing his and another crash of lightning directly overhead and it's as if it spikes between them, a wild current, and then he's gripping her hand like a vise and they're sprinting toward the building, him practically dragging her - and not to the door. There's a place near it and around a corner, a blind spot where no one in a tower or standing in a doorway can see, and he slams her up against the wall and shoves his knee between her thighs. She chokes out a squeak and that's all she has time for before he seals his mouth over hers. She opens to him instantly, and wouldn't you know it, pretty little Beth Greene is grinding her crotch down onto his knee and sucking at his tongue with a low moan, and maybe what he has his hands on isn't quite so innocent after all.

Out of his damn _mind._

Pinning her with his body, and she gasps in his air and arches when he closes his hand over her cute little _scoffable_ tit, and the dress’s fabric is thin and in half a second he realizes that she's not wearing a bra, and he feels her peaked nipple nudging hard into the crease of his palm.

The wall might be hiding them but it's providing them no shelter and they're still getting drenched. But they're already drenched so whatever, and he pinches her jaw and jerks her head up and licks salty water off her skin as she twitches and moans again, her hips rolling in a steady rhythm. She stutters and whines when he twists her nipple, and he pushes her head firmly against the wall as he releases her tit and maneuvers his hand between them, hauls the image out of his fucked up brain and clenches his fingers around her wrist and presses her cupped palm against his cock.

She stiffens and releases a shuddering whimper, her eyes so wide again, and he allows himself to wonder dimly if she's actually new to this.

Not like he gives a shit, considering how fucked up he is.

In fact, not like he doesn't really _like_ the idea.

“You feel that?” he hisses. She nods, teeth capturing her bottom lip, and he could eat her she's so adorable. “Squeeze me, honey. Squeeze me nice and hard.”

She does and he groans and rolls forward, humping at her hand - freshly aware of how she's still just about riding his knee. Not as much of a rhythm, nervous twitches of her hips, but panting as she does, and he stares down at her swollen, parted lips and her pink tongue, dilated pupils, edge of something like fear in her eyes that manages to not really be fear at all, and he's releasing her wrist and yanking up her skirt and lowering his knee as he thrusts his hand between her legs.

She spasms and a soft cry bursts out of her, and he bares his teeth and gives her another shove against the wall, forcing the breath out of her. “Shut the fuck up. You want someone to hear?” She shakes her head and he kisses her again, sucks hard at her lip, and when it pops free it's even darker and more swollen than before.

“Christ, you're so fucking pretty.” Nothing to lose here. At least not his sanity. Might as well simply say what's on his mind. “Get my fly open. Get your sweet little hand on my dick, girl.”

She's clumsily working his zipper down when he noses his fingers beneath the elastic of her panties, and he has to swallow another cry when he parts the lips of her pussy and presses his thumb against her clit.

She's so wet. Christ, she's so fucking _wet,_ so hot and slick, clit a fat nub beneath his teasing fingertips, and she spreads her legs even wider and gulps his name and fumbles at his shaft, draws it out and holds it loosely and awkwardly in her hand, and that's when he's positive: no, she's never done this.

 _Little slut’s a fucking virgin,_ he thinks, and then _holy shit what the actual fuck is_ wrong _with you,_ and then _shut the fuck up and let me get off._

He laughs - rough, grating. Not sure he's ever laughed like that. He rocks against her hand, allows some impatience to slip into it, turns her head with his fingers digging into her cheeks and nips at the shell of her ear. “You want my fingers in you? Want me in your pussy? Make you come? Tell me.”

She shivers and rolls her eyes in his direction, shuts them tight and nods.

He flicks her clit and she bucks and squeaks again and he grins. “ _Say_ it.”

“I want…” She swallows hard and opens her eyes, and as he loosens his hold on her jaw she turns to face him and her eyes are blazing. She's struggling, but if he had any doubts about whether or not she truly does want this, she just killed them dead. “I want your fingers. In my.”

“In your pussy, honey.”

“In my pussy,” she whispers, and she throws her head back and locks another cry behind her clenched teeth as he drives his finger into her.

 _Virgin, you sick fuck,_ he thinks again, feels her muscles fluttering around his knuckle and doesn't bother with slow. He fucks her in fast thrusts of his hand and she grimaces as she does her best to muffle her sharp moans, her hand tensing around his cock, and he thrusts into her fist in time with his finger in her pussy, the drumming of the rain drowning out the squelch.

“Jerk me off.” Teeth on her earlobe, tugging it into his mouth, sucking briefly. “C’mon, sweetheart, you want me to make you come, you pay me back.”

She is even before he finishes the sentence, jerking him in slides of her hand just as awkward as the way she was holding him, and he fucks her fist to guide her. She yelps when he adds a second finger to the one already in her, and he feels her tighten and then stretch to accommodate him as he shuts her up with another rough kiss. She tastes indescribable, like nothing but what he thinks of as _Beth,_ smells like sweat and wet grass, the scent he wanted to lose himself in. Somehow they've found a rhythm that works, their tongues working together and his dick throbbing in her hand and his fingers in her tight cunt, his other hand returned to her tit and kneading, her own free hand hanging on by his upper arm. He's got less than a minute, he can feel it burning up in him, and he grates her name and growls _ah, fuck, yeah, get me off, you hot little bitch_ and now whatever part of him was sane enough to be horrified is lost under this ravenous monster he's become.

This ravenous monster snapping his hips against her and snarling as he shoots thick come all over her pretty hand and her pretty wrist and her pretty dress.

She makes a strangled noise into the hollow of his throat, surprise and something deep and helpless and soaked in need, and he only fucks her harder, rolling into her fist all slippery with his release, grinds his palm against her clit, and she stiffens and shudders in waves and comes so hard with another one of those loud, helpless sounds, pussy tight around his fingers like she's clutching at him. Like she doesn't want to let him go.

Lightning blindingly bright and throwing their combined shadows against the wall. They look like a single creature, a mutation. Like that ravenous monster he is. That she's made of him.

No. No, he really can't blame her for this at all. This is one hundred percent him.

She’s going limp, sagging into him and gasping air into her lungs. He's basically holding her up. And he can, he will with his fingers still inside her sopping pussy, panting and breathing the words into her wet hair.

 _Oh, Beth. Fuck._ Fuck, _Beth._

And then his fingers are sliding out of her - she stiffens again, hiccups as if she's been sobbing - and washing clean in the rain, clean like her hand as she lets him go and her arm dangles freely, and her head settles against his chest and he's not holding her up anymore.

He's just holding her. Stroking her hair.

Some time he can't measure. The lightning has died away, though the rain is falling harder than ever. She curls her arms around his waist - feels like more for stability than anything else - and tips her head back and gazes up at him. She looks dazed, stunned - but she's also smiling. Tiny smile, not much more than a hint, but it's there.

He cups her face, lifts strands of hair away from her eyes. “Y’alright?”

She nods shakily. When she returns her head to his chest, it no longer feels like she's just hugging him to keep herself upright.

“We should get inside,” he murmurs.

It no longer seems real, what just happened. The slick remnant of her juices lingers on his hand and his come has to be staining her dress - God, please let the rain either wash it out between here and the door or let it not be noticeable - and she's tousled and flushed and her lips are puffy from kissing, but it started as a fantasy and he's suddenly having a difficult time believing that it didn't remain one.

She nods, and he disentangles himself and steps back from her, tucking his dick back in his jeans and blinking water out of his eyes as she rearranges her skirt and lifts the fallen left strap of her dress back onto her shoulder. He catches a glimpse of white panties as soaked as the rest of her, the dark patch of her bush visible through the cotton, and with a fierce lance of heat he knows: this was not temporary insanity.

He's got a bigger problem on his hands.

Just get inside. Get _her_ inside. Get away from her, dry off, focus on something else. Hand on her shoulder, gently herding her back toward the door like they simply came in from the field together - and that's what everyone will think, sure. Totally innocent, totally harmless. Rick Grimes is a widower and a father, a responsible family man, a pillar of this bizarre community. Rick Grimes does not finger teenage girls up against walls in the rain.

Rick Grimes sure as _hell_ doesn't _fuck_ them. And, well, yeah. He hasn't.

_Yet._

Yes. This is definitely going to be a problem.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I lied. Yet again a thing ended up being longer than I expected, and you get another chapter of Rick and Beth before Daryl appears. I'm sorry/you're welcome. ❤️

An hour after they're back inside, his sanity returns.

He leans against the concrete wall outside the cell block, listening to movements and voices and discussions about what needs to be done when the rain is over, how it's good because some of the barrels were getting pretty low, the soil around the pig pen under construction will be muddy as hell so they might call it off the rest of the day, it'll be good for the seeds that went into the ground yesterday provided it doesn't wash them completely out, and it sucks a little, because most of the time you don't notice the stench of the walkers anymore - it's just how the whole world _is_ now - but when it's wet, the worst of it comes seething back.

All that shit. Other shit besides. Daryl and Glenn talking about an upcoming run. Hershel talking to the new doctor about medical supplies. Carl playing with Judith, his voice low and sweet and his words inaudible.

His fucking _family._ Jesus fucking _Christ._

Beth saying something to Carol. Her tone is steady, even, like he didn't just finger her into a wet mess collapsed against him. Like he didn't just coat her hand in his come. Like everything is perfectly normal.

His eyes are half closed, and he closes them the rest of the way and allows the other sounds to vanish under the thrum of the rain outside.

It can't happen again. It won't. Doesn't matter how fucking good it felt. Doesn't matter how bad it seemed like she wanted it. There's everything else. The others, the people who for some reason have come to respect him - and that has to count for something. His chiIdren. Her _father._ How it would look, him so much as _touching_ her. How it would be.

If they got caught.

_Fuck._

Unimportant. Inconsequential. Because he's not going to. _They're_ not going to. He's going to look at her next time and he's not going to see that fucking sundress, her ripe little tits beneath that thin and clinging fabric, the swell of her hips, hot slick of her pussy under his hand, that flash of cotton panties beneath her skirt. Her full pretty lips and the knowledge of how they feel between his teeth. How they get puffy when he sucks them, kisses her rough. All the other things he could do with that mouth.

Make it do to him.

He's going to see what he's seen before: girl, sweet, young, just a touch naive maybe, wonderful with children, pretty in only an abstract way. Pretty in a way that's fundamentally sexless. Girl he cares about, sure - a hell of a lot - but fundamentally separate from him and anything he might otherwise want from her.

_Pussy._

Fucking hell, that sweet little pussy. Sweet as she is.

He shoves himself away from the wall with a growl and stalks into the shadows of the corridor.

~

But of course it doesn't go away.

In the rain, in a flash of lucidity in the midst of the madness, he knew it wouldn't. He sees her like this; he doesn't get to _un_ see her. Day after, just passing her on his way out to the yard - her with her arms full of laundry from the lines outside, clean and crisp from the summer breeze, she doesn't give him more than a glance, but he catches the way she stiffens. She's back to her conventional plain gray tank top and jeans, but now he can't help noticing how tight those jeans are, how they accentuate the curve of her ass, and later he imagines that small, luscious curve under his hands, squeezing it, kneading it, cupping it and using it to lift her and pin her against the wall. What wall? Any fucking wall, anywhere. Legs around his waist and his tongue thrusting into her mouth as his dick thrusts into her tight wet cunt, muffling her groans with his kisses.

Oh, _fuck._

This is so unfair.

Passing her again the next day - then more than passing her, and he feels a faint tremble of panic in his gut as he realizes they're both headed outside, side by side and too close for any form of comfort, her again in those tight jeans and a thin sky-blue tee that - at least when it comes to _his_ suddenly potent imagination - doesn't leave a lot left to imagine. Not that it's revealing in itself, but that her tits seem unusually close to the surface of the fabric and accessible to him in a way they shouldn't be.

There's hardly anything even _there,_ but she squeaked and wriggled when he tweaked her nipples, so she's got more than enough for him to work with.

He'd like to suck them. Hold her down and go to work on her with his lips and his tongue, bite her so carefully, tease them into hard peaks and make her do a lot more than squeak. How sensitive is she there? Seemed like she was, but he didn't get a chance to really test it. Wedge her legs apart with his knees and get a finger in her, get her so wet she's slicking his palm, flick her nipple with his tongue and her clit with his fingertips until her climax flows out of her like a wave. Lick her juices off his knuckles.

He almost walks into the doorframe.

He catches himself on one hand, looks at her in a way he knows comes across as - _is_ \- furtive. But she's gazing openly at him, no pretense in sight, her hand on the knob, and as he watches her, she sweeps her pink tongue across her lips.

 _Tease._ She has to be aware of what she's doing to him. Comes off so innocent, but he already knows that isn't true. She can be a dirty girl, humping her mound eagerly into his hand.

He could do so many dirty things to her.

He's so fucked up, and he only dimly wonders how this happened.

She takes a slow breath, her eyes wide - wide like they were in the rain, like a doe in the headlights but only if that doe also wanted the car to smash headlong into her, and that's when he catches her wrist, not rough but firm. If she wanted to pull it free he would let her.

She doesn't. Her eyes flick down to it, him, and back up to his face. And he thinks she might be very close to smiling.

Wicked smile.

He leans in and down, nearly close enough for his lips to brush her ear, feeling the heat of his own breath on his skin. Smelling his own thick arousal, his dick swelling in his pants. “Gonna come see you tonight,” he breathes - before he realizes he's going to, before he can stop himself. He's giving in. Caving like he's shaken by an earthquake. _Come see you,_ and that could mean any number of things. Awful things.

Wonderful things.

She gives him an almost imperceptible nod, and he fights back a shiver.

It’s not going to go away. Her _sweet little pussy_ sure as hell isn't going anywhere. So he can either keep kidding himself, or he can dive the fuck in.

~

The impracticalities of doing anything in her cell are immediately obvious. But lying on his back on his own bunk that night, feeling the hours roll by and listening to the block settling down and dropping into its own collective slumber, its stirrings and creakings and murmurings, and throughout all of this trying to ignore his maddeningly persistent erection, he realizes with a freshly appalled wave that he _likes_ that. Doesn't want to be discovered, _fuck_ no - for her sake probably even more than his, because he can't think of any possible way in which this makes her life better - but the possibility of discovery. The very horror of it. The adrenaline. Danger. Hand slipping down between his legs and palming himself, _getting off_ on just how fucked up this is. He was never like this.

Right?

But then it slams into him, the memory - he forgot it completely but here it is as brilliant and vivid as day. Carl had a babysitter for a while, girl of nineteen or twenty working on paying at least some of her way through her first year of college, also a penchant for tight jeans and thin tees, and more than once she went braless, bigger than Beth though not much, nipples tantalizingly visible. Returning with Lori, offering to drive her home, and he did, plenty of times he did, and then more than once he went back home after and practically threw Lori onto the bed and flung her legs apart and fucked her until the bedsprings squealed and she was trying to tell him - through her laughing moans - to keep it _down_ because Carl’s room shared a wall with theirs.

Loved her. Loved his wife with everything he was. But God, he can't hide from it because his own sick brain won't let him: it would have been so good to pull over and get that girl in the backseat and go to town on her until her cream stained the upholstery. And in his head, he did.

If he had tried, he honestly thinks she would have wanted it. Let him do it. He could have. Never would have, but _could._

Since then, the world ended. _His_ world ended twice.

So when the block is as silent as he knows it's going to get, Daryl making his silent way out to pull a shift on watch, he gets up and he goes to her.

Her cell is on the same level as his, but down at the other end of the block. He creeps past bars backed by curtains, hears a whisper here and there, but it might not even be waking talk. Has to be after midnight, maybe well after. But she’ll be up.

She is. Faint light through the sheet covering the front of her cell - pretty floral pattern, not exactly like that fucking dress but so close to it, and as he approaches it and puts out a hand to touch it, he'd swear his cock twitches.

He has no idea how he's supposed to not come in seconds.

He doesn't knock. Doesn't whisper. He curls his fingers around the edge of the sheet and pulls it to the side just enough to slip through, and there she is.

Without electricity, they've started making use of kerosene lanterns and candles, and her cell is lit with a couple of the latter, the dancing flames throwing weird shadows against the walls as she sits up in bed. She was reading, and she lowers the book onto her bare thigh, spine-up: _Anne of Green Gables._

He doesn't know why that's perfect. Only that it is.

She's not wearing much. Looking at her, he gets the sense that she often wears this to bed as a matter of course: plain, pale green chemise and a pair of equally plain gray boxer shorts. Nothing intentionally or blatantly seductive, but the chemise is as thin as her shirts and he can tell that if she was standing or stretched out, the front is cut high enough to reveal her belly. The shorts ride high on her legs, and below the waist she's all smooth, creamy skin. Her strong, slender arms, her hair falling loose all around her shoulders, her eyes once more wide and shining and her full, glistening lips parted.

He wants to do dirty things to her, yes. But looking at her now, there's something simpler moving through him. Something that makes less of its home between his legs. The thing is, she's more than pretty.

She's beautiful.

She licks her lips. Not that she needs to. But his knees briefly weaken. Fuck, that tongue. “Hi,” she whispers.

He had no plan for after he got here. He has no sketched-out way in which he wants to proceed. Of the things he can reasonably do with her here, he has no priorities. So for a moment all he can do is stand there like an idiot and stare at her, hands tense at his sides, cock pounding blood and need.

Then he knows. He doesn't actually _have_ to do anything right now. Not unless she demands it from him.

He nods at the shorts. At her beneath them. “Take those off.”

It's soft. Not cold, not intended to intimidate her. But it has an edge, a backbone, and her hands are trembling very slightly as she awkwardly hooks her thumbs into her waistband and starts to push it down. No arguing or hesitation, but she's going slow, and he could tell her to get a move on because he doesn't have all damn night. But he doesn't want that. He watches as all that naked skin comes into a new kind of view, as if the passage of the shorts over it is peeling off a layer of cover he can only see now that it's gone, and his mouth goes dry as the candlelight catches the blond curls of her bush. He's been hard for what feels like hours, but now he sees how _wet_ she is, and he fights back a gasp.

She draws her legs up and spreads them enough to get the shorts past her ankles, and those curls are glistening above and around her fat cunt lips - those dark pink and glistening like her pubic hair. She ignores them, but when she drops the shorts by the bed and returns her attention to him, she must be able to discern what he's looking at, because she freezes and draws a sharp breath, her legs still the smallest bit apart.

Christ, she's so fucking _cute._

He crosses his arms. Okay, she did one thing he said. Maybe he can experiment with this. Maybe this is a game they can both play, and one they can definitely play here. If she wants. If she wants it.

_If the hot little slut wants him to make her beg for it._

“Get your legs open, honey,” he says softly - barely above a whisper. “Show me your pussy.” He draws his own breath and forges ahead, and it's not difficult at all. “Show me what I'm gonna fuck.”

A whimper lodges in her throat and her hands twitch against the insides of her thighs. She doesn't move, not immediately, and he's considering being firmer with her and what that might entail when she raises and bends her knees and lets them fall open, showing him all of that soaked heaven waiting for him, and it's all he can do not to grin.

Step closer. Slight bend at the waist; she's thrown half into shadow this way but he can make out the textured folds of her inner lips, the plump outer lips framing them, and above everything her clit protruding from beneath its hood. Maybe aching as much as he is. For contact. For touch.

Without being asked, she reaches down and glides her fingertips over her labia, presses them apart to expose lighter pink and the winking hole nestled there, semi-translucent liquid seeping from her and trickling down into the crack of her ass, wet spot on the sheet beneath her.

His mouth waters, sudden surge of it, and he knows exactly what he wants to do with her.

Eventually. For now she deserves another kind of reward.

“Good girl,” he breathes. “Oh, that's such a good girl.” Without noticing it, he dropped his own hand between his legs, and he's kneading his cock. Keeping himself simmering. Not that he needs the assistance. “Why don't you play with yourself for me, sweetheart?”

Another soft gasp. “Rick-”

“Go on. Do it.” Smile. It feels like a wolf’s. “Play with that sweet little clit. Do it good and I'll lick it for you.”

So nice, to find someone it's easy to talk to.

Her breath is hitching but she doesn't hesitate again. She joins her other hand to the one already there, keeps her lips spread as she ghosts her fingertips across her clit and trembles. Without meaning to he's taking a step forward and then another, gazing at her all spread out for him like a fucking three course meal, as she settles her fingers over her clit and presses, circles. Spirals in and out.

Deliberate. Cognizant and intentional. No shrinking violet. Maybe some of the wide-eyed innocence is real - possibly a lot of it - but he's now all but certain that it's also an act in large part for his benefit. Like somehow she immediately knew what he liked.

Knew it maybe before he did.

_Slut._

“Just like that,” he breathes as she moves a little faster, her eyes flicking up to his and then fluttering and rolling as she starts to work herself in earnest. Not quick, not yet, but getting herself up to speed, and as he stares down at her he begins to undo his belt.

He's not going to fuck her yet. But he's not doing this out of some kind of twisted charity, either. Like before in the rain: he’ll make sure she gets hers, which gives her a job to do.

“Anyone ever watch you touch yourself before?” She shakes her head, biting back a moan and sliding a finger into her cunt with a quiet squelch. “You like it?”

She nods shakily. Anytime either of them speaks it's a bigger risk but he can't help it. Can't stop pushing. He reaches into his fly, curls his hand around his cock and sighs as he starts to tug it free.

“Say it.”

“I like it.”

“You like it when I watch you?”

“ _God,_ Rick…” Her breath catches when she realizes how loud she said his name - she must - but she doesn't stop. Doesn't miss a goddamn beat. The wet, sticky sounds of her pumping finger expand into the air like tiny ripples, her nimble manipulations of her clit, her hips rolling upward as if she's chasing something. Then her eyes are open, fully open, and locked onto his cock and following his hand as he strokes himself. He could hold off, could be generous, and maybe before whatever happened to him out there in the rain he would have been inclined to do so, but he's selfish now and he can't bring himself to give a fuck, and he stops even thinking about it; he moves closer to the side of the bunk and she turns to face him squarely without being told - _such_ a good girl - her upper body lifted and braced against the wall and her strong thighs starting to quiver as her breath comes in ragged pulls.

She's already so close, he almost can't stand it. He's seen her once, what her face does when she comes, how her eyes squeeze shut and her mouth tightens into something that resembles pain. She gets lost when she comes. She falls into it. He kicked her over.

Christ, he loved Lori so much, but she never did this to him, never made him feel this kind of powerful.

Never looked at her with her fingers in her cunt and had a dark looming part of him think _This little bitch is mine._

He’s been jerking himself slowly, almost lazily, but now he quickens and braces a hand on the top of the bunk and leans over her, hips canted forward, watches her as she watches him, the sheen of her juices on her hand matching the precome smearing over the edge of his. Sheen of spit on her pretty lips. Shit, he wants to suck them.

Both sets.

“You like this too.” He bobs his chin down at his dick, the motions of his hand rapid and rough. Wet smacking in chorus with her sounds. “You dirty girl, you want it? Huh? You wanna taste me?”

She doesn't make him ask again. She nods, flicks her tongue against her top lip, and she's teasing him and she completely means to. He's fighting so hard to stay quiet but he can't hold back his growl and he holds himself above her bare stomach, sighing thickly as a single bead of precome drips in a long glimmering strand to just below her belly button.

“C’mon, then.” Inspiration. It all is. If he stops to consider this he might have to stop everything. He releases his cock and braces himself up with both hands, bending awkwardly and ignoring the complaining of the muscles in his back. “Get me off. Make me come all over you.”

She withdraws her finger from her pussy with a shallow gasp, pushes herself up further and curls her soft little hand around his base, and leans forward with her mouth open. Flash of anxiety in her eyes that he doesn't think is faked for his benefit, and it's all he can do to keep from gripping the sides of her head and thrusting into that waiting mouth, all hot and ready for him, but instead he seizes her jaw and pinches a wince out of her as he presses her cheeks against her teeth.

“Not that way. Do it with your hand.”

Later. Soon. He lets her go with force that's almost a shove, and she catches herself before she falls against the wall, eyes flicking up to him again and that anxiety intensifying, and he loves it and he has no idea what he's fucking doing.

He'll reassure her later. Right now he wants her scared of him, just a little, and he wants her aching for it.

Already got both, pretty much.

She sits up as she starts to stroke him and she’s much less clumsy this time, and he wonders somewhat whimsically if she's found someone else to practice on, staring down at her jerking him off and picturing it: her on her knees, disheveled, her lips swollen and wet the way he's seen them, thick cock twitching in her hand with every slide, and look at _that,_ she's gazing up at-

It happens suddenly, so suddenly he whines through his clenched teeth, bucking his hips forward and spurting across her belly in pale ropes and pumping weaker over her fingers and wrist, and she breathes _oh my god Rick_ and doesn't stop until he hisses at her that it's too much.

Even then he’s mindlessly fucking her fist.

She waits, frozen, blinking at her come-streaked hand with a faintly stunned expression, and she seems surprised when he pulls free of her and drops into a crouch, panting, takes her wrist in a hold that's close to gentle and pushes it up toward her face.

“You wanted to taste it. Clean yourself up now.”

She's definitely in a daze as her lips part to admit her fingers and she sucks, licks - hesitant, clearly working the taste over her tongue, also clearly not totally enamored of it - which he realizes he likes even more than if she loved it. She'll do it for him.

Whether she likes it or not.

He watches her until she's gotten every drop and she glances down at her belly, the rest of it streaked across her skin, and she's dropping her hand but he takes her wrist again and stops her.

“No. I want it to stay.” He touches a fingertip to the largest spatter of it and smears it into a wide circle, painting her with it, attention briefly captured by himself. By what he's done to her. She was so pretty in the rain and she's so pretty now, and right then he understood that he wanted to ruin that prettiness. Mess it the fuck up. Take this innocent sweetness she projects and corrupt it.

This is a good start.

He shifts his gaze up to her flushed face. “You still want me to eat you out? Make you come?”

She swallows. Nods. Whispers, breathy. “Yeah.”

“Alright, then.”

He doesn't bother tucking himself back into his pants as he lowers himself the rest of the way to his knees and runs his hands up the insides of her thighs, the downy blond hair there, the coarser hair of her bush. Abruptly he thinks she would look so good shaved clean, her lips and the shaft of her clit completely exposed to him, but she looks so good like this too, and he tightens his hands on her and bends in, buries his face in her pussy and inhales deep. He doesn't even exactly mean to but then her smell is filling him, heady and musky and delicious before he's even got her in his mouth, and he catches her eyes rolling back and her jaw lax in a moan as he dips his tongue into the cleft between her labia and gives her a quick little cat-lick.

He raises his head. “No one ever do this to you?”

She shakes her head, her eyes still half closed, and he grins.

“Settle in, honey.”

She props herself up on her elbows and her hips lift as he spreads her, and this time his licking is broader, a long swipe from her perineum to her clit with a flick at the end. He honestly doesn't have the widest range of experience but he's never tasted anything remotely like her - in his opinion the perfect combination of sweet and an edge of bitterness, and so much of it, scooping it out of her, pressing his tongue as far into her as it can go before he pulls back and finds a swift rhythm that draws sharp whimpers from her throat.

He nips her and she slaps a hand against her mouth to stifle a yelp, and it's dangerous and utterly counterproductive and he couldn't care less. Hypocritical too, because he bares his teeth and hisses at her.

“Shut the fuck up, you slutty little bitch.”

Startled. _Aghast_ at himself. All at once he comes closer than he yet has to taking it back, trying to offer an apology, but she's flushing bright crimson, her eyes equally bright in the candlelight, and she's…

She's smiling. Chewing at her lip and smiling, still that veneer of innocence, and what's beneath is unmistakable. He really doesn't think he's misreading her. She loves it. Fucking _loves it._

He dives back in.

He's not toying with her this time. He's working at her, firm, stopping just short of aggressive - indulging himself and sucking at her lips and her clit until her breathing is strained and hectic, one hand clutching at his shoulder as she desperately tries to restrain the rolling of her hips, trying not to grind against his face. And he would tell her to go ahead but he's busy, coaxing more of her cream out of her and into him, wrestling back his own moans. His dick is still hanging out of his fly, and he almost wishes he hadn't told her to make him come, because it would be so nice to jerk himself off while he does this, hand and tongue working in sync.

But he can. He can do a version of that joined motion. He slides a hand between them and beneath his chin and noses her lips apart with a fingertip, laughing into her pussy when he enters her and she clenches around him. Fuck, he adores this, her, fingering her as she flows into his mouth. She's tensing, winding up.

Rising.

He could tell her to wait. Back off. Stretch this out, torture her. And he could do that until he's hard again and get up, climb on top of her, fuck her like he promised he would. But not yet, no, and this is all he wants right now: her climax building in her core and racing its way to its apex, a final arch and then wild, helpless shudders rocking her, hand once more jammed against her mouth to muffle her sobs, and it could very well be his imagination but he would swear she pours into him, gives him enough to practically drink from.

 _Slutty little bitch_ is his.

She collapses. Goes still. Drifts back down, panting as hard as he did, and as he pushes back from her he sees her eyes wide and glazed and staring at nothing, strands of hair sweat-glued to her hairline and cheeks and neck.

She’s so beautiful like this. He could see this a thousand times and he doubts he would tire of it.

He waits. Gives her a chance. Lays his head on her thigh and breathes with his slick face cooling and drying tacky in the air.

Another thing he doesn't care about.

He knows she's fully returned when he feels her fingers combing through his hair, and he turns his head, softly kisses her clit, smiles against her when she jumps a little.

And it comes to him then that left only to his own devices, he might like to stay with her. Not go back to his own cell at all but strip off his clothes and lie down beside her, drape an arm over her waist, fold himself around her and sleep. It comes to him that she might like that. That she might not want him to go. She might, he wouldn't be surprised if she does… but wouldn't be shocked if she doesn't.

She doesn't seem like the type of girl to get off and immediately tell a man to get out.

But he can't. He can't stay. Can't risk it, and also it doesn't sit totally right with him. Unless she asked him, _really_ made it clear that she wants him to, and he knows she won't do that.

She knows how this has to go just as well as he does.

He zips up and slowly, reluctantly, he pushes himself up on his knees and then groaningly to his feet, stiff in ways he didn't realize until now. His jaw and tongue ache.

Worth it.

She's gazing up at him - focusing, scooting forward, and he can see that she's still shaking around the edges, a loose smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. Maybe he saw anxiety there before, but now, lit half in red-gold and half in shadow, he can't detect any trace of it at all.

She just looks wearily happy.

He reaches down and lays his hand against her jaw, thumb stroking over her lips, and she leans into it, smile wider and brighter. And the thing is, _this_ is really what he wanted to see. The rest of it, whatever is happening to him and with them, yeah, it's plenty fucked up, but this part doesn't feel wrong, and _none_ of it actually feels bad.

He's not doing anything to her that she doesn't want. Or he has faith that she would let him know if he did.

He falls back into a crouch and frames her face, kisses her mouth. Nudges her lips apart and she opens to him, her hands finding his shoulders and one curling around the nape of his neck. She's tasting herself as she licks at him - he knows it and it sends flickering light like sparks along the pathways of his nerves. Tasting herself and eager for more, even if she _is_ tired out. Fucked out.

But not as much as she could be.

“Generator room,” he murmurs, and nips at her jaw, and she releases a low hum as she tilts her head to give him more access. “Tomorrow night. Same time.”

_Show me what I'm gonna fuck._

“Alright.” She nods, holding him tighter, and he shifts back enough to look into her clear blue eyes. That smile. He can't get enough of that smile.

He wants to shoot his come all over that fucking smile.

“Wear that dress for me.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think those of you who are into this and are still awake might appreciate the balm. Hope so, anyway. 
> 
> Also: You may note that the number of chapters is now a ?. Because - as KEEPS HAPPENING - this is longer and more complicated than I thought it might be. We'll see where it goes.
> 
> Special thanks/blame needs to be hurled at Schwoozie. She knows what she did.
> 
> ❤️

It's been a long time since he really _looked forward_ to something. 

Not that life has been miserable. Shit, no. Life, Rick supposes, has been pretty decent for the last couple of months, all other things being equal. Hard, sure, but the overall trajectory is upward, and watching this place grow around him has been a good thing. But what did he actually have in that? What did he have that was more than abstract? _Concrete._ Something imminent, something _real._

Something he can touch. 

Helping clear out a space for additional food storage - a floor down so it'll stay cooler than it would at just above ground level - he thinks about it, about her, and he indulges, because why the fuck _not?_ Now that he's given up the hopeless task of keeping himself from thinking about her like that at all. Now that he’s sure she _wants_ him thinking about her like that. Tyreese handing him a pile of scrap wood, carrying it outside to the yard, the weight of it in his arms and thinking again about lifting her and slamming her against the wall, burying his dick in her and fucking her so fast and hard she's muting her cries against his neck. The taste of her pussy still on his tongue, the way she jerks and squirms when he flicks her clit, her soft hand on him. Come streaked across her creamy skin. Lips parted and wet and swollen. Wide, deceptively innocent eyes. 

_Dirty girl._

And - strangely, later that afternoon, sitting in the shade of the building and spooning his way through a too-sweet can of fruit cocktail - that brief fantasy of her _practicing_ , gone off to find someone else so she’ll know what to do with him when he comes to her. On her knees with a man standing over her, a man who isn't him, whose identity he can't discern. Thick cock in her hand, stroking slowly, her eyes lifted to gaze at an unseen face. She's stripped to the waist, tiny breasts and pert little nipples standing out hard in the cool air, goosebumps rising along her arms - maybe not just the temperature. 

Hand in her hair, equally thick fingers combing through the strands. Almost affectionate. Then seizing her by a clenched fist full of that hair and yanking her head forward, gripping his cock with his free hand and thrusting into her mouth. She's fumbling at the man’s hips, choking, but he's merciless, fucking her pretty face, hissing a curse and withdrawing with a sudden wrench and dragging her head back to spatter come all over her cheeks and chin and onto her waiting tongue. 

Releasing her only to push a thumb past her lips, pulling them into a distorted _O_. Stroking her hair, affectionate again. A voice, low and gravelly. 

_Slut._

He hasn't taken a bite in… He doesn't know how long. He's so hard it's fucking painful. Can't do anything about it just now; only sit and suffer with it, and wait for tonight, when he won't be suffering anymore. 

When he's going to give her that, and then some.

~ 

He didn't tell her a specific time - a time, yes, but only inasmuch as she even knew what time it was last night. And at some point not too long after the block settles down and begins to drowse in the dimness, he's up and heading out for the stairs with a lantern in his hand, because he's _impatient_ and even more because he's thinking about waiting for her down there in the shadows, being there when she arrives, small and dainty in that pretty dress. He thinks for a second or two about virgin sacrifices, and he's vaguely appalled by himself, but honestly… 

Honestly, he's sort of beyond that now. Or he should be. He's practically swimming in reasons why this is fucked up and why he should turn around and go back to his bunk right _now_ and not pursue this any further, because he knows exactly what he's going to do to her when he gets her down there, and it's not going to be soft or gentle or even especially considerate. He's going to _fuck_ her. He's going to spread her wide open and fuck her so good.

It's like she's given him permission. 

They cleared this whole place out a long time ago, and it's remained clear. The scuffle of his boots on the poured concrete is unnaturally loud, amplifying the not entirely comfortable feeling that he's completely alone down here - even though, for the moment, that's exactly what he wants to be. 

But when he pushes the door to the generator room open and peers into the dimness, it's not as dim as it was supposed to be. In the far corner, by a squat blocky equipment cover about the height and size of an average dining room table, she's standing and staring at him with huge eyes. 

He halts. Looks back at her as his mouth seems to go dry and flood wet simultaneously. She has her own lantern set on the flat metal surface beside her, and the light it casts over her is soft and unearthly, leaching the color out of her skin and hair. The yellow in her dress appears more like a pale moon-tone, her neatly braided hair the same, and he knows from experience that her cheeks and ears and neck are flushed, because he wouldn’t know it to look at her. 

She's what he imagined - dainty and pretty, girl on the cusp of womanhood - but it's also easy to imagine her as something more. Not a ghost. He never wants to see another one of those. But not human. Older, and powerful. 

And he knows that it doesn't matter what a dainty, pretty girl she seems to be. Whatever he does to her now, he'll do it only because she's decided to allow it. 

He moves forward again, slower, every step purposeful and carefully placed, boots creaking against the gritty floor. Staring at her like he is, he catches the waver of her shadow across the wall as she shies backward. But he’s not fooled; with everything in her she's surging forward _toward_ him, licking those lovely lips as if she's getting them wet for him, and he imagines them stretched all pink and glistening around his shaft and tightens his jaw against the groan. 

“Look at you,” he breathes, and she bites down on her bottom lip, her eyes somehow widening even more. His fingers are twitching at his sides, squirming to touch her. “Pretty girl, you got yourself all dolled up for me?” 

_Doll._ Something to move how he wants, arrange for his pleasure. She doesn't answer, though, and all at once he's standing right in front of her, herding her back against the wall with his body - not especially bigger than average but he feels like he's looming over her, like he could break her with his bare hands. She whimpers softly and he snaps his hand up and grips her jaw so hard it has to be painful, his other hand wasting no time and groping for her small tit, and it's heaving into his palm with her heavy breaths. 

He leans in, teeth scraping her ear. “Not gonna tell me? Think you can play all innocent? Think you can make me buy it, you slut?” The soft, slightly rubbery texture of her cartilage between his teeth as he bites a sharp whine out of her, finds her peaked nipple beneath the thin fabric and pinches. “You know you're down here so I can fuck you, girl. And I'm gonna. Baby, I'm gonna fuck you so damn _hard_.” 

Though not right away. He rolls his hips forward and knows she feels it when she sucks in a light gasp: his cock straining against his fly and trying to bust through and get to her. He grinds on her, unhurried, rubbing against the left knob of her pelvis until his breathing is dense and eagerly rhythmic, and he kneads her cute little tit until she's grinding right back, head tipped upward, lungs expanding and contracting in hectic puffs.

And he figures that more is more, grapples with her wrist and drags her hand between them, grinning as she gasps when he forces her to cup his length. Squeezes her fingers to make her squeeze him.

“Feel that? That's all for you, baby girl. Yeah, I'm gonna put that in you. Just like I promised. So let's see how wet your pussy is. See if you're ready for it.” 

He releases her hand and fumbles with her skirt, working it up until he can slide beneath it, and it doesn't take any further searching; she's right there, her bush a yielding cushion when he presses, and nestled lower down, the puffy bulge of her vulva. Still trapped beneath her soft cotton panties, but like so many of their clothes, it's worn enough that he can essentially feel right through it and the spreading damp patch of it, and right at the tip of his middle finger is a firm nub - and she hisses and jerks when he pushes down on it and circles. 

“That good?” His mouth pulls into a mean grin. He doesn't need a mirror; he knows perfectly well that it's mean. “You want more? You want me to play with your clit?” 

Again, no answer. Just another whimper. He nips her and she winces, close to a yelp. “Tell me, bitch. Tell me what you want, or I'll just fuck you and that's all you'll get.”

“I want it.” 

He moves his fingers away, into the cleft of her top inner thigh. “I didn't hear that.” 

“I want you to play with my- my…” She undulates her hips into a desperate circle, seeking him. “God, Rick, play with my clit, _please._ ” 

“Good manners, baby.” He chuckles and presses again, and her moan is ragged and helpless as she awkwardly opens her legs further. He could tease her more, really _wreck_ her, but even if he's mean, there are limits to it, and he pushes the crotch of her panties to the side, working under the elastic of one leg hole and nosing into the wet, throbbing space between her swollen pussy lips.

Instantly she's trickling down his knuckle, and he merely laughs again, undisguised delight. She can know how much he's enjoying her. 

She should. 

“Christ, you're so wet. Feel that.” He withdraws his fingers, ignoring her disappointed sigh, rucks her dress further up around her waist and smears them across her lower belly, just above the line of her pubic hair. But he doesn't linger; span of a few breaths and he's back where he was, middle finger pushing into her and crooking just a bit in a come-hither gesture. He grazes and then curves into a place at the top of her wall, and she holds back a wail between her teeth, her head tossing weakly, and he knows he has to do that to her again. 

So he does. Over and over.

Her entire body is rocking into him, struggling without genuinely struggling, and twitching violently when he rubs her clit with the slippery side of his thumb. Another few breaths and she's curling her arms tight around his neck, holding on like he's saving her, and he realizes that he can't stop her when she winds her moans around herself and rises into _aah-aah-aaaaaaaaaaah_ and then she's over, sobbing against him as she shivers and bucks, hot gush over his finger and his knuckles and the back of his hand. 

“Good girl,” he murmurs. Her internal muscles are still fluttering around him, rapid and uneven as her panting. Her delicately trembling form, and warm, soap-fragrant skin against his cheek. He still means to fuck her raw, fuck her until he has to slap a hand over her mouth to muffle her screams, but just as he did in her cell, he feels her now and catches a glimpse of one clear eye beneath her long lashes, and what sweeps through him like a storm front is so much gentler. 

He wants to fuck her up, make her scream, leave marks on that warm skin and muddy the clean fragrance with his sweat and his come. And then he wants to hold her after, hold her in his arms until she stops shaking. 

_My good girl. Mine._

He gives her a little time. Minutes. But it's just a reprieve before he's moving again, merciless even though it's slow: fingerfucking her dripping pussy and tracing the seam of her quivering lips with his tongue. 

“You still want it?”

She hiccups, as if she's been crying. Nods. 

He kisses the corner of her mouth. “I wanna hear you say it, baby girl.” 

“Fuck me, Rick.” 

He pulls back and blinks at her, struggles to focus. Vision as a sense had retreated into general unimportance, overwhelmed by what was coming at him through his ears and nose and fingers, and every bud on his tongue. Relying on it so abruptly feels strange, and the shadows thrown by the twin lanterns are strange as well - stranger than when he got here. He can't quite make sense of the expression on her face, but sound remains prominent, and her tone wasn't shy. Wasn't hesitant, or blushingly needy. She was _demanding_ just now, practically ordering him to do it, and even if she still looks delicate and so very young in her pretty dress - even with her skirt rumpled and pulled high and one strap loose down her arm, her panties slid down her right hip - there's a hungry glitter in her eyes that he’s positive he's not imagining. 

He feels disoriented, more than a little crazed. But he only requires so much coherence in order to imagine what it might be like to turn this around, give over. Let her take whatever she wants from him. 

It's not unappealing. Not remotely. 

But that's not how this time is going to go. He decided that well in advance of now and he's not deviating. He bares his teeth, grips her by the shoulder and hip, and in one hard wrench he spins her around and shoves her in the direction of the waist-level metal cover, following her stumbling progress in a single lunge. 

She barely catches herself with her hands before he's on her, curling his fingers around her ponytail and yanking her head back, her slender neck straining and her mouth open in a pained moue. Her tendons stand out like guitar strings as she grimaces and swallows, and he glides his lips down the side of her throat to her shoulder, sucking hard at the ridge. 

His belt clinks bizarrely loud as he undoes it with his free hand, and to his delight she shudders and releases another one of those sweet little-girl whimpers - more desperate when he drags up her skirt again, tugs his cock free and strokes the head across the skin of her ass, leaving sticky streaks of precome behind.

Even later, he's not sure why he asks her what he asks her. It's not as though he’s in special need of an answer; he’s come to his own conclusions here and he feels pretty damn solid in them. But very possibly he just wants to _hear_ her, hear this too, and he places another sucking kiss on the edge of her jaw before he hauls her panties down her thighs so roughly the elastic rips with a protesting _snap_.

“You a virgin, sweetheart?” Yet another kiss, the pop of the seal his mouth made, and she twitches and sobs. He can't tell if it's the question that's gotten that reaction out of her. 

He hopes it is. 

A few seconds of waiting, then he gives her hair a vicious twist and she cries out, her voice high and pained - and musical in spite of it. “You better fuckin’ tell me. You a virgin?” He knees her legs roughly apart, nudges his cock into the crack of her ass and she moans, all hopeless. “You ever take a cock in your tight little pussy? Or am I the first one?” 

Hesitation, a long one. One that feels, for all the world, more like her _making_ him wait than anything else. 

And, like he knew she would, she manages a nod. 

He gives her hair an even more vicious twist and she keens. “Whatcha nodding at?” 

“You're the first,” she whispers. 

It's sick, it's _really_ fucking sick, but he laughs at that, a rich laugh, pleased all the way down to the core. He's not going to waste the time or effort pretending that he's not. He rolls himself forward, pitching the angle down, and strokes the head of his cock up her slit, dizzy at the sheer potential of that sweet slippery pussy. There's nothing in her to break through, as far as he's been able to feel, but he's still going to… 

He's going to tear her up. 

“Sweet girl, yeah.” He flicks his tongue against the outer shell of her ear, kisses the knob of bone just behind. “I like that. I really fucking do. Don't you worry, honey. I'm gonna take care of your pretty pussy. I'm gonna make it so good for you.” Poised, now, the give of her entrance and his cock already easing its way between her labia. All he can see is the back of her head and side of her throat and the edge of her cheekbone, but in his mind’s eye he can see her stricken, pleasure-drenched face, and it swells his come in his balls like magma. “You ready for me now?” 

Once again, she nods, but this time he doesn't wait for her. He releases grip on her hair and, before she has time to catch her breath, seizes her right wrist and snaps her arm up behind her back - a move he's made on plenty of arrests but not one he's ever made on a girl he's about to fucking _deflower._

Not that there have been too many of those. 

Her cry is almost loud enough to be a real scream as he uses his hold on her arm to slam her upper body down against the steel, and at the same instant he thrusts into her with no more preamble and no particular care, so deep in her tight, hot cunt that the front of his thighs smack against the backs of hers. His head sinks between his shoulders and he groans through his clenched teeth, digging his nails into the meat of her hip. It's so good, so _good,_ and maybe he said he would make it good for her but right now the only party involved in this who matters at all is him. 

“Oh, _shit,_ baby.” He twitches backward, withdraws an inch or two, and bottoms out in another cruel thrust, ravenous for her broken sobs - the better part of them lost in her tousled hair. “Shit, you slutty little girl… Your pussy is so fuckin’ _sweet-_ ”

Suddenly she goes rigid, breathless. For a bad second or two he's scared that he's genuinely hurt her, hurt her in a way she didn't want, and as it turns out under his gleeful selfishness he _does_ give a fuck. But then he sees that her head is slightly lifted and her focus appears to be on the door across the room, the one he entered, and he raises his head to follow her line of sight. 

Goes rigid too.

He can't immediately identify the shape. It's familiar - of course it would be, he knows everyone here by now - but whether it's simple shock or something else, he can't get any further than that. But it shifts in the shadows of the doorway, emerges just enough into the light that half its face comes into view, and then it's a lot more than familiar. 

Dark curtain of hair partially obscuring bright, piercing eyes. Well-defined cheekbones. Scruffy jaw, that Rick isn't certain he's ever seen in the act of being shaved. A known face, belonging to a good man. A man he realizes, in a cold wave of horror, he never would have wanted to see him like this. To see _her._

“ _Daryl,_ ” Beth gasps.

And Rick knows that it's not Beth, not really, who's absolutely fucked.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Took a while, I know; hope it's worth the wait. ❤️ And no, it isn't done. Of course it's not. This is me we're talking about.
> 
> Also, I think some of this stuff could be read as SLIGHTLY dubious consent? It's not being written that way, though; subsequent POV chapters will make that clearer.

For what feels like goddamn forever, no one moves.

Except that's not true. _She's_ moving. He feels frozen inside her, motionless as stone and almost as cold in spite of the overwhelming heat he's sheathed himself in, but she's panting, trembling in his grip, her whole body angled up off the metal so she can stare at the man in the doorway.

So she can _stare_. She's not looking away. She's not trying to hide, not cringing or jerking free of him and attempting to cover herself. She's staying exactly where she fucking is, and she's _staring_.

And so is Daryl.

Not doing what Rick might have expected - not turning around and practically flinging himself back into the shadows, getting the fuck out of dodge as fast as he possibly can, and probably trying to forget he ever saw this at all. Not doing something else plausible, though less likely, and charging forward to haul Rick off her, maybe snarling, demanding to know what the fuck he thinks he's _doing,_ manhandling a teenage girl like this, what the fuck he thinks he's doing with his _dick_ in her. Perhaps even wondering if she genuinely wanted what Rick was doing to her, so rough like that. So nearly vicious.

Which makes him feel vaguely ill.

No. Instead he's gazing at them, at the two of them, and Rick can't see his eyes clearly but he can feel them, the pressure of that gaze moving over the two of them. Over Rick. Over Beth, as if being balls deep in her cunt gives him the power to sense what she senses. The pressure of that gaze - and then it hits Rick’s dead-on, and all at once he's shivering, and it's not fear. It's not shame. It's something so much deeper and darker and _hungrier_ , that savage beast inside him that Beth seems to have awakened rising and rearing. He might be losing his mind - very fucking likely he is, and he's been thinking that for a while now - but he's also thinking of the way Daryl has ducked his head when Rick has told him to do something, of the way he adopts a blatant attitude of obedience even if Rick isn't doing much pushing or trying to pressure him into it. And it's sick to take advantage of that, it's fucking _sick,_ but what he's doing now is plenty sick already even if she _does_ want it, and he hears the words coming out of his mouth before he can stop them, hissing between his bared teeth.

“C’mon over here.”

Beneath him, Beth gasps and twitches violently. Daryl doesn't move.

 _Stop_. No. _Jesus fucking Christ,_ no, _don't stop at all._ He releases Beth’s hip and seizes a fistful of her hair, glowing strands silky curled around his fingers, and a cry bursts out of her as he yanks her head up. This is going to be too much. This is what's either going to send Daryl packing or get him over here at lot faster than Rick is demanding, get him _over here_ and maybe drive his fist into Rick’s nose. But Daryl is just fucking _standing_ there, and now with another hot shiver Rick sees that his hands are shaking at his sides and his breath is coming in shallow jerks of his lungs.

 _What the ever-living sweet Christing fuck are you_ doing.

“You like this? Huh? You want some of this tasty little bitch?” Once again the words are just coming, flowing easy as a summer stream from that awful place inside himself, the one that's making him into something he barely recognizes. “She's givin’ it up, Daryl. She wants it bad. Get your ass over here and give her some.”

In a dreamy haze, he watches Daryl as he starts walking.

It seems to take a long time. It also seems to take no time at all. Rick blinks and there Daryl is, standing in front of and beside them, exactly like before, his hands loose at his sides and his eyes boring into them. Into _her,_ and Rick gives her hair a cruel twist and angles her head around to face Daryl, keeping it raised. Her pussy is clenching around him, tightening and releasing in a steady, frantic rhythm, and he takes pity on her and withdraws slightly, rolls in hard and bottoms out.

And Daryl moans.

It's not loud. But it's there, low and dense in the back of his throat, his eyes half-hooded and his features twisting into a brief spasm. His lips are parted, wet, though Rick doesn't remember seeing him lick them. He catches a glimpse of her lips, just as wet and swollen pink from his kisses, and then she's talking, her voice calm and sweet even if it's strained by the arch he's forcing her throat into.

“It's alright, Daryl.” She manages to extend her free hand, and as Rick looks at them, speechless, she touches the backs of his fingers. It's so gentle. It could be chaste.

Could be.

Daryl releases a slow, shuddering breath, and she smiles at him, warm and so fucking gorgeous. “You don't have to. But he's not lyin’. Okay? I want it.” Her smile widens and she closes her fingers around his. “I want you.”

“ _Beth,_ ” Daryl breathes, tight with obvious shock, and she groans and pushes her ass back against Rick’s crotch, coaxing. Needy.

“I want both of you.” Her fingers slip free of his and trail down his belly, already drawing a half-voiced exhale from Rick before those slender little fingers glide below Daryl’s belt and across the very visible bulge of his cock. “I do. I want you both to have me.” She squeezes the bulge cupped in her palm, and Daryl bucks his hips forward and whines her name.

Eyes open, on Rick’s again. _Is this real? Yes?_

Rick nods, his heart jackhammering behind his ribs. _Yes_.

And all at once he's fucking her again.

Not as fast as he might be. But more of those hard, smooth slides, out far and thrusting in deep, one hand grasping her wrist and the other tangled in her hair, pinning Daryl with his stare. Watching as Beth lets out a broken moan and somehow finds it in her to keep kneading Daryl’s cock even as her entire body jerks rhythmically forward and back over and over, swelling it even more. Swelling _everything;_ the world is a red haze in Rick’s head, power like lightning lancing all the way down his spine - he can do _anything_ here, he knows it now, and this has to be a dream but he doesn't give a shit. He _wants,_ and he's going to _have_.

“Get his fly open, Beth.” Said in ragged puffs of breath. “Get his dick in your hand. Go on, show me just how much you want it.”

She keens, sounding even more broken than before, but she's fumbling at Daryl’s zipper and he's still only standing, head lowered and focus fixed on her as she draws his zipper down and squirms her fingers inside.

“ _Shit_.” He's trying to play the big man, the boss, trying to play like he's in control, but she does _that_ and Daryl rolls his head back and closes his hand around her wrist, not stopping her or shoving her in further but simply holding onto her, and Rick slows and almost stops as she tugs free Daryl’s thick, glistening cock. And Rick really shouldn't be paying so much goddamn attention to another man’s dick, but he can't seem to help it now: the dark, blood-engorged tissue, the way the smooth skin is stretched so tight, the vein he can see snaking up low on one side. Foreskin stretched around the head as tight as the rest of it, darker head exposed. Precome gathering around his slit, practically pooling, practically dripping down her fingers.

He shouldn't, oh sweet God he _shouldn't,_ but he's aware in a way he can't escape that his mouth is watering.

No. _Her_. This is about her. The deep wonderful slickness of her pussy, the front of his thighs wet with her and smacking as they come together and apart and together, the rumpled folds of her pretty skirt pushed up around her waist and the full, delicious curves of her ass cheeks quivering as he fucks her - and shit, she doesn't have a lot of meat on her, but that _ass,_ he could take a goddamn bite out of it if he got the chance. Her sighs, her hand squeezing Daryl’s shaft, her pink lips and her mouth hanging lax, the way she's totally helpless under him, this sweet little girl who makes such a pretense at innocence and is such a dirty _slut_ under the costume.

Under the dress.

Daryl is rocking into her fist, now holding her hand in place so he can fuck it, his eyes shut tight and his lip caught between his teeth. The conflict is there. The urge to flee. The ravenous need to stay. Lost already because of a fucking handjob, more pliable than maybe Rick ever knew. Certainly more into this than Rick ever expected, because what he's doing with her now does not appear to be out of obligation. And Rick can keep him here, chain him to this rather than merely tie him.

He's still in her, mostly forgetting himself as he shoves her head forward, nearly knocking her into Daryl’s knuckles. “Mouth open, baby. You suck him now.”

Daryl’s eyes snap wide.

Maybe, Rick thinks, hectic. Maybe this, then, will be the bridge too far. He's pushing those lines, he understands - he's toeing them and then sauntering over them like the arrogant prick he seems to be, just waiting for the one that'll fling him backward. Daryl especially, testing him and testing him, and maybe Daryl is loyal as hell, but Rick isn't too much of a fool to know how stupid it almost certainly is to test Daryl too far.

Over a line, even a good dog will turn and bite.

That he's even thinking of Daryl this way. That's a line. That right fucking there is a line for which he apparently has no respect whatsoever.

Yet again, everything is still. Yet again, everything is abnormally loud. Beth is moaning in the same rhythm in which he was fucking her, even though he's no longer doing so, and he can see tears shining at the corner of her one visible eye, and it doesn't make him want to stop at fucking _all_.

But she's also gripping Daryl’s cock in her soft, delicate hand. And Daryl is breathing so hard, hair hanging in his face and already damp with sweat, cloaked in the shadows he brought with him into the room.

There's a beast in Rick, and it's awake and hungry. But there's also something else, and abruptly it's sliding back into the driver’s seat, and when he speaks his voice is gentle, even if it's hoarse and the words are filthy and he should be ashamed of them.

“You want that pretty mouth on you? Or don't you? You can have it. Like she said. You can have it if you want it.” He pauses. Swallows. _Yes_. This is how it should be. It's fucked up and he can't even begin to deal with what it means but it's still true. “I want you to have it, Daryl.”

_I want to watch you._

Blink. Slow. Slightly feline in nature, though not so cool and appraising. But there's no apprehension visible on Daryl’s face, no fear at all, as he lets Beth’s wrist slip free of his hand, reaches up and out, and his fingers graze across Rick’s where they're combed into her hair. Just a bit hesitant, and Rick gets the distinct sense - could be with some relief - that Daryl isn't so much touching _him_ as touching him because he's in the _way_.

So he shifts his hand. And Daryl slides into its place, cups the back of Beth’s head, and his dark gaze doesn't flicker as he guides her in. Parts his lips, and even if he's looking at Rick, he's speaking to her.

“Do it.”

He sees everything. Somehow; it shouldn't be possible, but he does. Daryl’s glittering eyes - _never_ in all the time he's known him has he seen Daryl look like this, and it occurs to him that maybe he's not the only one in whom something dark and hungry is awakening. He sees Beth’s mouth falling open, Daryl holding her hair back in a messy, snarled ponytail, the tears at the corner of her eye now leaving a shimmering track down her cheek. That pretty mouth he was offering, those plump, luscious lips, and Daryl’s cock sliding easily between them, deeper and deeper as his head once more drops between his shoulders and he groans at the low ceiling. Voice rough as sandpaper across concrete and dropping close to a purr. Gripping the sides of Beth’s head with both hands now and fucking her face in the same unhurried rhythm he was using with her fist. Spit-sheen in the lantern light, their shadows dancing on the wall.

It's so fucking beautiful. He watches. He's entranced.

That fantasy he had. Her on her knees and the unseen man standing over her, her head clamped in place as he rammed his cock down her throat until she was choking on it, gagging, spit dripping down her chin and her eyes streaming with tears, and then that spit and those tears covered over with hot come shot across her sweet slutty face. He didn't see who it was.

Maybe didn't let himself.

He's seeing it now. Fucking _hell,_ he's seeing it now, and he can't stop looking at it, mouth suddenly parched and his throat coated with rust as he flings her forearm away from him and scoops his hands beneath her body to yank her top down and cup her tits, gets those hard little pebble-nipples between his fingers and thumbs and pinches her so sharply that she squeals around Daryl’s cock. No mercy; he loves that squeal, absolutely loves it, just about uses that cruel pinch to drag her back against him as he starts to fuck her again.

Not slow this time. He grips her by the tits and leans over her and pounds her, and he both hears and feels her dress rip down the front and he wants to laugh. He wanted to fuck her up and that's exactly what he's doing, and wouldn't you know it, he has help, because Daryl is meeting his eyes once again and speeding up to match him, that fantasy turned real. She's sobbing, muffled and choked, her blunt fingernails scrabbling against the pitted metal and her back half exposed, lean muscles flexing beneath her skin and thrown into sharper definition by the strange light. All of her, in fact, bathed in it, and as he slams his body into hers he grunts and mutters that she's _so fucking amazing,_ she's so gorgeous, such a pretty little slut, so _good_ for him, that tight sloppy pussy and how she's taking him like a damn pro, how much she wants it and how he's going to give it to her until she can't even _walk_.

How she looks with Daryl’s dick down her throat. Asking Daryl: _She doing alright? She doing what she should do? Is it good?_ Christ, if her mouth feels even _half_ as good as her cunt does, like her pussy lips are sucking at Rick’s cock every time he withdraws, like they're eager. _Fuck, yeah, Daryl._ Shit, _give this bitch what she's asking for, give her_ all _of it. Every goddamn inch. Look at her, Jesus, she loves it. Can't get enough._

Bending closer, letting Daryl handle her head but using her tits to press him and her chest-to-back, his teeth against the nape of her neck. Yeah, she's loving this. Loves how he's fucking her, like she's a cheap whore, like her pussy is all his. Her mouth. All her tight little holes. Sure, he's loaning her out. Doesn't mean anything.

She came down here, all dressed up, to get fucked. So she's getting fucked. His hips are stuttering, bright pressure building at the base of his skull, and he raises his eyes and he's looking at Daryl again, Daryl looking right the hell back at him. Glowing eyes, like coals, like lurking fire. And he's noting the tremble in Daryl’s muscles, the tension, how close he is.

Thinking: she’s not the only one who wants it bad.

_You wanna come, Daryl? Yeah, you fucking come. But don't you dare come in her mouth. You shoot it all over her face._

_She's a slut. Treat her like one._

He's not even certain he's saying it. All he can hear is his own harsh panting, Beth’s moans - and then maybe he did say it, because Daryl is letting loose a string of hissed obscenities, jerking her head back and pulling out with a wet pop as the suction of her lips breaks around the swollen head of his cock. Such clear flashes, like snapshots: her tear-blurred eyes rolled upward, locks of damp hair sticking to her brow and temples, and a single gleaming strand of spit stretching from her bottom lip, stretching and stretching and dripping at the same instant Daryl takes hold of himself with his free hand and spurts milky ropes of come across her face.

Like Daryl has punched him after all. That's how suddenly it hurtles into him, pistons him deep with a cry bitten off behind his teeth, and he barely manages to pull out of her in time before he's decorating the small of her back and her tailbone and her ass with pearly beads. Pretty, somehow.

Pretty as she is.

Then both of them are gasping. Holding onto her. And she's limp between them, shuddering and sweaty and streaked with come, whimpering softly. Almost like she might be crying. Except when he reaches out with a shaking hand and lifts her hair away from her cheek, he can see that she's not. Despite the tears.

She's smiling. Loose and exhausted, but she is.

This is where he wakes up. Or opens his eyes and he's alone in his cell with his softening dick in his hand and a distinct sense of embarrassment twisting at him. Possibly more than that, because there are things here, elements of this that he's been way too interested in. Better if he doesn't think about it at all.

But he closes his eyes, opens them, and it's all real. Dreamlike, half lost in shadows, but clear enough. He does have his softening dick in his hand. But the rest of it?

Her tit is in his palm.

Daryl is silent and utterly motionless, still gripping himself, and Rick can't see his eyes through his hair. There's no way to know what he's looking at. At her. Him. Them. Whether he's aghast what what they've done, disgusted, angry - or whether he's feeling something else entirely.

But first and foremost, there's her.

He called her a _bitch_. A _slut_. He can't be certain but it's possible if not likely that he called her a _whore_ somewhere in there. He heaped abuse on her. Since this started, he's hurled filth at her that he's never said to anyone, not even in the depths of his fantasies. He's fucked her and he's _fucked her up,_ and tomorrow she'll have bruises to remind her. Pretty little Beth Greene, and if she was telling the truth she just lost her virginity bent over a piece of equipment in a dirty generator room to two men who are the better part of twice her age. Two men who are going to have to face her decent, honest father tomorrow without crumpling to their knees and confessing everything.

He called her those names. But before, between the wall and where she is now, he was overswept by that urge to be gentle with her, gather her into his arms and hold her. Stroke her hair. Tell her that she's pretty and simply _mean_ it.

Tell her that she's beautiful.

All those names, yes. But now he sinks down over her, his own come sticky on his hand and his pubic hair and his lower belly beneath his shirt, and he tugs her hair aside as he kisses the edge of her ear, side of her throat, nape of her neck - glancing up at Daryl’s unreadable face as he does.

“Baby,” he whispers, and she smiles wider and sighs. “Oh, baby girl, that's so _sweet_.”

There's a lot to worry about now. But not now. Later. Now it's all her.

_My good girl. Mine._

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With everything that's happened with Rick - and now with Daryl - there's a lot on Beth's mind. There's a lot that's scary. There's also a lot that makes her feel strong in a way she never has before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There were multiple calls for Beth's POV, and I figured that at this point it made sense to explore it a bit, because while there are some indications, she's really been a bit of a mystery. I also wanted to make it clear that she's even more than a willing partner in this, and the level of her control is considerable. 
> 
> And yeah, I'll be doing the same for Daryl. 
> 
> Thanks as always for reading. Comments are love. ❤️

It takes her a while to process. Really, she's still processing. Her entire life since the storm has been broken up into a series of aftermaths. There's what happens, and then there's what happens after, when she's lying alone in her cell and feeling her own body and what's been done to it and how it's changed, and wondering about - unraveling, unwinding, untangling the knot that is _her_ \- who she even is anymore.

Because she's honestly not sure.

And it's not freaking her out half as much as it should be.

In the rain, she was scared. She won't lie to herself, and if he asked her, she wouldn't lie to him. She was scared when he pressed her up against the wall, shivering, his size and his strength and the knowledge that they were out of anyone’s easy view and of what he could do to her if he wanted to, and for a few moments, feeling his length and his heat as he rubbed himself against her, she forgot who he was, forgot that he was _Rick_ and he wouldn't hurt her, would _never_ hurt her, had never been anything but kind to her, had never done anything but take care of her the same as the rest.

He's not a monster.

That's actually what she thought, then.

For a few moments she forgot who he was, and all she knew was that a powerful, looming male body was pinning hers against the wall and dragging her hand down to his groin, his _cock,_ and making her touch him. Closing his hand over her breast and squeezing. Thrusting his tongue into her mouth, grinding his knee up between her legs, and when all that came together, the last of the fear swept away under something else flooding in and drowning it out. It was good, it was so _good,_ how he was making her feel. Rough hands, rough everything, forcing her open to him, but he didn't have to force by then. He never really had to force. Even when the fear was riding high, he never had to do that at all.

She was scared. But she didn't want him to stop.

Never felt anything like his fingers inside her. Nothing like hers. Stretching her so much it almost hurt, stretching her so much she was almost scared again, but _wanting,_ her pussy - her _pussy,_ she never actually used that word in her head the way she did after - clenching around him and her clit one giant overheated nerve. Him _fucking_ her. Her orgasm a brilliant punch in the chest. His come slick all over her hand. First time for that. First time for all of it. None of it how she thought it would be. Dirty. _Filthy_. He never said he loved her. He never brought her flowers, held her hand. She's not a total innocent, but she always…

She thought it would be different. She thought she wanted something different.

He called her a _hot little bitch._

Drying off in her cell later, dress limp and wet on the floor, she looked at herself in the mirror. Her hair was a soaked tangle. Her skin was pimpled with gooseflesh, her nipples small and tight, and through the drenched fabric of her panties she could see the darker outline of her bush. She looked at herself and she wondered if she was supposed to look the way she did before, or if some internal change should manifest externally.

Long fingers in her, pumping in and out. Holding his cock. Knowing where he could put it. His thickness, thicker maybe than his two fingers together, the way he twitched when she tensed her fist. Then, realizing: she could make him do that. She made him shudder and wrench against her, make those indescribable sounds - not unlike pain - and she dragged him to the brink and made him release. The incredible truth - that she _made him do all of that._

She stood there in the dim rain-light and looked at herself, at the body he had his hands all over, the body he so clearly seemed to desire, and she wondered what else she could make him do.

~

Later in bed, lights out, the block quiet. Her trying to maintain her corner of that quiet, lip firmly clamped between her teeth, her shorts kicked off and hanging on by her ankle as she spreads her legs wider. She's touched herself, sure. She's been doing it in one way or another since she was twelve. But not like this, not with this kind of wild, exultant abandon. Her chemise pushed up under her arms, nipples stiff little peaks in the cool air, clutching at her own tit as her fingers push her pussy lips apart and thrust in. Curved, hooked, wiggling up against her wall in a come-hither motion, she tosses her head as pleasure slams into her and she bites down so hard on her lip that pain spikes up to join it. So wet, slippery all over her hand, withdrawing to work her clit in firm, rapid circles as she pinches her nipple. Twists.

It hurts. She _wants_ it to hurt. She jerks her head to the side and buries her whine in the pillow. Her mind is a searing, gasping loop of everything he could do to her. She should feel so bad. She's such a dirty girl. She was supposed to be _good,_ wanted to wait for romance and love and a beautiful wedding night, or at least a beautiful night with the promise of a wedding, and instead she's getting herself off in a prison cell and imagining a man almost twice her age wrenching her legs apart and ramming his cock into her, fucking her so ferociously that the bunk clatters against the wall. Not saying he loves her, but instead calling her that word again, that thing he said that she could scarcely believe, and then could scarcely believe how much it turned her on.

_Hot little bitch._

She should be ashamed of herself. She is. She's _hot,_ yes; her face and ears are burning with that shame she should be feeling. And somehow it only makes it better, her fingers squelching so loud the rest of the block has to be able to hear it and sparkles of delight rolling from her clit and all through the branches of her nerves.

She could make him. Lie back on her bed and spread her legs, spread her swollen labia, show him. She's never actually gotten a good look at herself like that, but she can imagine what he would see. Her lips fat and dark with blood, the flesh between them pink and glistening, maybe even her juices trickling out of her and into the crack of her ass. Beading in her pubic hair, smeared across the inner creases of her thighs. She could draw him in like a fly to her honey. Make him give her what she wants.

 _Bad girl._ Oh, fuck - dirty word, word only bad girls say. Bad girls who don't wait for weddings or love but just want their holes stuffed full of nice big cock and pumped full of come, _God,_ she can't believe what she's thinking, it's disgusting, it's _sick,_ oh, Rick, _fuck me. Fuck me, fuck my pussy, I want it. I want it so bad._

_You know you want it too, you filthy man._

In a spasm she releases her tit and plunges her other hand between her thighs, fingers seeking her entrance and sliding in one-two and then three, stretching like he stretched her. Like his cock would stretch her if he put it in her. The world around her is a supremely unimportant dark blur. It's all just her fingers in her pussy and on her clit, fucking herself because he’s not here to do it for her, muffling her groans as best she can as she draws her legs up and in her head she slings them over his shoulders and he absolutely _pounds_ her, his body holding her down and making her take it, but she's got him, got him right where she wants him. She _is_ taking it, she's taking exactly what she wants from him, _dirty bitch, dirty little girl, yeah, take it all, take my fucking cock,_ shit, _here it comes, baby, gonna give it to you now, oh fuck, Beth, FUCK_

Heat pouring into her and she floods out against her hand, running between her fingers, humping herself up and biting furiously at her pillow - and she wants to scream. God, she wants to _scream_.

Lying there staring up at the shadows on the ceiling, the softest glow of light through her curtain. She's exhausted, her hands curled and sticky at her sides. Sticky between her legs. She feels sticky everywhere, her hair lank with sweat. _Dirty_.

She barely recognizes herself.

Eventually she turns over and curls up tighter, arms tucked against her body, making herself small. The shame has returned, thrumming relentlessly in her core. This is not what she was supposed to want. This is not who she was supposed to be.

_Well, tough shit._

She knows she's not going back now.

~

So by the time he comes to her cell, she’s pretty sure she knows exactly what he wants, and even more importantly, how he wants it.

She's never met anyone like it turns out he is, no. But she's got an active imagination, always has, and especially so now. She's read books, seen TV shows and films; she’s more than familiar with the Dirty Old Man cliche. That's not Rick, at least not completely, but she saw how he looked at her in her pretty dress, how he talked to her, how he hissed in her ear. Rough with her hands. _Made her_ do things, just stopping short of actually forcing her.

He wouldn't have. She doesn't doubt it. If she actually tried to stop him, it never would have gone any further.

But it did.

What he'd like? He’ll probably like her best when she's demure. Willing but a little nervous, hesitant, timid with hot eagerness under the timidity, and in the end when he coaxes her out of her Good Girl cocoon she can be bolder, give every appearance of someone who was scared to want it but wants it so _bad_ and now has permission from such a deliciously _bad man._

Thing is, it's not even all acting. Hand on his dick again, and he thinks she's doing what _he_ wants and he's not wrong, but this is what _she_ wants: his long cock twitching in her small, delicate fist as she jerks him off, glistening head close enough for her to get her mouth on - and her nervousness definitely isn't a pose there, because she never has and he’ll be able to tell, and what if she hates it, what if she's bad at it-

But then it hits her and she wants to giggle. Of course. He'd love that part. Not her hating it, but everything else?

Exactly what he wants.

And then he's coming so hot and slippery all over her hand, her wrist, streaked across her skin, and the taste of it when he makes her lick it off, sharp and salty and bitter - she doesn't particularly like that, no. But she sure as hell doesn't _hate_ it. And she hates it even less when she glances up and catches a glimpse of what his face looks like as he's watching her.

Then - well. Staring down at Rick Grimes’s head between her legs, stubble prickling her skin, his pink tongue flicking at her clit and his cheeks smeared and shining with her, her juices practically dripping off his chin when he lifts his head and gasps for air, and then diving back in and fucking into her with that strong tongue, teeth on her lips, scraping and sucking at her clit - this is when her estimation of what she can realistically make him do shoots up to another level, and when she comes like an eruption and frantically muffles her cries with her hand, she's also trying to muffle her delighted laughter.

He called her another name, and it still burns shame through her but a hell of a lot less of that now, and even the shame continues to give it an edge that makes it better. He called her another dirty, dirty name and it flushed heat directly into the core of her pussy.

_Slut._

Put it this way: he's not wrong.

But before he goes, there's that kiss - more than that kiss, deep and tasting of her own tangy juices. There's something even softer inside it. It throws her. Except maybe it shouldn't, because he was like that right before they went inside in the rain, after they finished. He was gentle with her. He was…

He was like she always expected this might be, with a man, when it was time.

After he leaves and the light is out, she lies awake in bed for a long time, thinking. And not just about what's going to happen to her in that generator room. Though of course there's that.

There's a _shitload_ of that.

~

Again: she's had a long-standing and well-imagined and robust collection of ideas - fantasies, really - regarding how this was all supposed to go.

Started innocent in the early days. Yeah, it was a cliche, informed by every saccharine romance she was ever exposed to. Almost a PG-rated version of _losing her virginity,_ all soft and sweet and candlelit, satin sheets and gauzy everything, fading to black just as the clothes started to come off. She wasn't even a hundred percent sure about the actual mechanics. Then PG shifted to PG-13 and maybe it was a slightly heavier, a touch more explicit: the idea of her breasts and his hands on them - this unknown but perfect Mr. Right Prince Charming - and his cock hard against her mound, nudging into her but only something she would _feel_ and never something she could _see,_ him whispering that he loved her as he moved with her, as she lay on her back with her pajama pants around her ankles and her legs spread and her fingers rapidly circling her humming clit.

Then rated R. She saw everything, felt everything, and he went harder, gripped her hips and thrust into her, her nipples peaked and sparking with pleasure, his precome clumping in her pubic hair and her juices shining on the insides of her thighs. Coming in waves with her fingers pumping in and out of her pussy, covering her mouth with her free hand to hush her moans as the moonlight spilling through her bedroom window spread across her like milk.

Still all love and romance. All sweetness. Even if he was a bit rough with her, there was such a deep gentleness at its softly beating heart.

Nothing like this.

Bent over this metal casing, drenched panties half torn off her and her dress shoved up around her waist. Her arm wrenched up behind her back as if he truly is forcing her. Cold steel against her cheek. Grimy lantern light, their shadows warped on the wall. His heavy breathing hot on the back of her neck, forcing her legs apart, the head of his cock sliding up and down her lips. She feels bruised down there and he isn't even inside her yet. She hurts. He's _hurting_ her. It feels so good.

What the hell is _wrong_ with her.

No more hesitation. He's not slow. He's not gentle. Whipcrack of his hips and spine and he's in her, _ramming_ into her; he feels so big and he's so ruthless and she bucks her ass back against him so slick, so sticky, so _dirty,_ smack of their colliding flesh, and he calls her a _slut_ and she is and she loves it.

A wild cascade of awful words through her mind. She still doesn't know where they're coming from. Has she ever even heard these words in this combination? _Bad girl. Dirty girl. Filthy bitch, cock-slut, oh my_ God, _Rick, I am, I'm a slut, give it to me, make me_ take _it, you make me so wet, I'm_ dripping _for you, feel it. Feel how wet I am, all over you, oh Jesus. Jesus Christ._

_You know you want it. You want my tight little teenage pussy, you dirty old man. You know you'd do anything for it._

_You'd get down on your goddamn knees and beg me._

And all at once everything changes.

Later, much later, she has no idea how she did it, whether it was courage or sheer insanity. No idea what it means. Shot her up to yet another level. It never in a million years occurred to her that she might even _consider_ it, let alone _do it._ Let alone encourage it. Coax and entice.

Let alone _Daryl_. Because he's a sweet man, and he's good and he's always been nice enough to her, but she never saw him _that way_ before, except maybe once or twice for the most fleeting of moments, working on his bike or lifting crates out of a truckbed, muscles flexing and his skin glistening. But looking at him now. Looking at him looking at her with Rick’s cock in her up to the balls.

Looking at what she saw in his eyes.

She never. It shouldn't have been possible, what happens next. Rick tearing her pussy open and Daryl gripping her head as he takes her mouth. His smooth skin and his weight, the taste of him all salt and musk, filling her nose, slurping between her stretched lips. She's helpless. Stuffed full in both holes. Rick leaning close as he fucks her in unsteady pistonings of his body, telling her she's a _sweet little whore_. Yes, she is. She exults in it. Oh my God, _if Daddy could see her now,_ and her cheeks are on fire. Daddy’s Good Girl taking two men at once for her _first time,_ taking it like she adores it, because she does. She tasted Rick’s come and she wasn't sure she liked it but she's damn sure she wants more and she'd like to sample Daryl’s, and she's grinding her pussy back and down and shuddering as Rick seizes her tit and twists cruelly at her nipple, wet squelch ringing off the walls, harsh grunting and rough groans, curses, obscenity, God, the whole thing is so _obscene_.

_Give me your come, Daryl. Shoot it in me. Shoot it right down my throat._

She's only sort of disappointed when he spurts it across her face. But she licks her swollen lips and tastes it - similar but different. Saltier and less bitter. Thicker somehow.

Good.

This is not how she ever imagined it: limp against the gritty metal, soaked in sweat and come, two men looming over her and panting with the exertion of fucking her. She feels soiled. She feels used. She _was_ used.

She was used precisely how she wanted to be.

Got him to do that, she thinks as Rick bends and kisses her - light and careful. _Baby girl, that's so sweet._ She got him to do it. But really, he was easy. Daryl was something else. No matter; in the end she made it happen.

Lying there, a damp and no longer virginal mess, musing on how she's apparently one of those girls she once would have felt nothing but a snobbish kind of pity for. No self-respect, no self-control, no standards. Just giving herself away to anyone who wants her. And for the first time, she's actually alarmed by her own power. By what she might really be able to do.

Of course she's going to find out. She's going to know how far it goes.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shocked by what happened and horrified by himself, Daryl faces The Morning After alone. He would frankly like to stay that way. But someone has other plans.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Daryl. Be forewarned: the first part of this chapter may be a little emotionally difficult; it definitely got angstier than I expected for a shameless smut fic. Not really all that angsty by my standards, though. 
> 
> Comments are love. ❤️

All the way back to his cell he can't stop shaking.

Can’t stop shaking after he gets there, either. Stands there for a moment after he pulls the curtain closed and stares into the dimness and simply tries to control his breathing. He doesn't feel like he can; he doesn't feel like he can control _anything,_ everything slipping through his fingers - _fingers sticky with her spit and his come, oh fucking_ Christ - horror warbling up through his chest like the vibration of a scream he won't let himself voice.

He did that. With her. With them. He actually just did that. He just.

Zipped up and walked away and left them there together, Rick bent over her and stroking her hair and murmuring to her. Walked away because he couldn't remotely handle it and because he was filled with the sudden sickening certainty that he wasn't supposed to be there anymore and in fact had _never_ been supposed to be there no matter what she or Rick said, no matter what kind of permission they appeared to give him. _Walking away_ is what he should have done the second he followed those alarming noises to their source - and how the fuck he didn't recognize them for what they were is an utter mystery, he's heard them often enough before - and found them there like _that_. Should have walked the hell away and stayed away, and forgotten about it as best he could even if that was always going to be ultimately impossible.

He didn't walk away. He stayed. And he did. He.

His hands are clenched into trembling fists. One of them is tacky, come drying on his knuckles. Didn't even have the wherewithal to clean himself off. Her mouth. Oh my sweet holy Jesus, her fucking _mouth_.

_He did that to her._

He did that to her and he _liked_ it.

He presses one of those trembling fists against his mouth and tastes the cool salt of his own come, and he can't even focus enough to be disgusted.

Okay. Okay. Eyes closed, teeth digging into the skin stretched tight over his bones. Okay. He didn't… She wanted it. It's not like he made her. That's not what happened. She made it very clear that she wanted it. She told him, touched him, she was softly coaxing. She beckoned him as if he was a shy animal, and she was sincere in every word and every look, otherwise surely he never would have gone near her. She wanted it, so gripping the sides of her head like that and fucking her pretty face, he wasn't _making_ her, he wasn't _forcing_ her, she _wanted_ it so it's okay.

Except shit, what if. What if he had it all wrong. Somehow.

He stumbles to his bunk and sinks down onto it and lowers his head between his shoulders, rakes his fingers into his hair and twists until his eyes water. It should be ugly. It's an ugly thing. He's seen it before in the shitty stolen porno VHS Merle made him watch when he was eleven to _make a man outta you_ and he's seen it in more than one greasy motel room and more than one sticky-floored roadhouse bathroom, seen tear-streaked faces and mean smiles and they pretend to like it but they don't, and he can always tell. The deep-seated revulsion comes off them like a bad smell, unmistakable, and that's before the tears and snot and spit start dripping down their cheeks and chin, and then a rough hand jerking, hissing abuse, adding sickly pale jelly to the other fluids, and it's awful.

There were tears. He saw them. And he shot it all over her face. Rick said to. _She's a slut. Treat her like one._

She was so pretty, though. Even like that, she was so unbearably pretty.

How the fuck is he supposed to face her tomorrow - and phrasing, holy _God_ \- and not crack? How is he supposed to face her ever again? How is he supposed to look her in the fucking eyes? How is he supposed to face Maggie? How - and this might be the worst in a host of ways - is he ever supposed to face _Hershel?_ Grabbed his pretty little daughter by the hair and fucked her mouth while Rick called her just about every filthy name he's ever heard, and he _liked it._

Could have walked away. Didn't. Could have charged in there and demanded to know what the fuck Rick was doing. Didn't. His choice and his alone. He can't put this on Rick. Rick didn't make him do anything either.

The block is quiet. Not a murmur, a creak of footsteps. Too quiet. His own breathing is like a roar, his heart is rolling thunder, and all around him in that breathless quiet, a crowd of people is staring at him with knowing, judging eyes, scrutinizing every inch of him for the evidence of what he's done, invisible faces contorting with disgust. And behind him, deeper in the dark, Merle is grinning at him, because _finally found your dick and did somethin’ with it, huh, little brother? Finally got yourself a bitch and used her good, just like I always said you should._

_Was fun, wasn't it? Makin’ her take it. Messin’ her all up like that. Take it from ol’ Merle, the good girls always like it rough, no matter how much they holler._

It was… He doesn't fucking know. Cringes away from that voice, from what it's saying. She's a sweet girl. He likes her. It's not like that. He wouldn't. He never wanted to, never that. Never would have. None of those women, none of those faces, gaping mouths, red-stained gashes, knowing what was really going on behind those dead eyes. That's not him. He told himself a long time ago, that wouldn't ever be him.

Not looking, he gropes for a discarded shirt, uses it to wipe his hands. Drops it onto the floor and collapses onto his back with an arm slung across his forehead, stares up at the darkness gathered against the ceiling. So he's freaking the fuck out. Too bad. It happened. He has to live with it now, knowing that he's capable of that. Knowing what he can do.

Knowing that he's a complete piece of shit.

~

He falls asleep like that, half on the bunk with his arm hiding his eyes, and his dreams are gasping, pulsing things that seethe through the dark and flow hot into his veins, and in the morning he wakes up feeling hungover with a raging hard-on and his stomach lurching with nausea, and the immediate memory of what he's done. It's too bright through the windows even with the curtain between him and them, glaring like the light of an interrogator’s lamp - _where were you last night and what the fuck were you doing and with who_ \- and he groans and rolls over, pushes himself up on one arm tingling with half-sleep, and scrubs at his gritty eyes. He's gotten used to not changing his clothes for days on end, and he was used to not bathing for the same amount of time even before the Turn, but maybe he's just gotten soft since they took the prison, because he feels _filthy_ and it's awful. His mouth tastes like some nightmarish sour version of his own come.

It's been a long time since he had any kind of sex, but he doesn't recall it making him feel like this.

Well. It's not like he doesn't fucking deserve it. Every miserable second.

Hard-on or no, it withers in moments and he's left sitting there in mere misery, looking out at the block through the crack between the bars and the curtain across his cell, listening to the sounds of wakefulness - quiet conversation, some laughter, clink of dishes and the smell of cooking wafting in from the space they've set aside as their smaller secondary indoor kitchen - and thinking about how he's going to have to go out into that world and pretend as best he can that everything is normal. Because he can't hide in here. Can't do that. People will notice, people will want to know why, and he'll only be able to put them off for so long, because at some point that he's given up trying to make sense of, they all appear to have decided that they _like_ him.

If they had any fucking idea.

He drags himself to his feet, rummages through a pile of semi-folded clothes resting on a chair across from the bunk, finds some briefs and pants and a ragged shirt that seem reasonably close to clean, grabs his toothbrush and towel and the last sliver of his soap, turns and pushes the curtain aside.

He can do this. He's forced himself through worse.

Nothing bad in the way this is, though. Nothing remotely like it.

~

He doesn't see her. Doesn't see Rick, either, or Hershel, or Maggie. In fact, he doesn't see many people at all, and judging by the angle of the sun and his own inner circadian dial - confused though it may currently be - it's still relatively early in the morning. Hershel is customarily an early riser but likely he's outside, doing what chores he can. Rick too. Beth…

Maybe Beth is simply sleeping it off. Not literal intoxication, but whatever poured into them, put the three of them into a place where they could do what they did, which is something he never would have believed any of the three of them capable of.

Except… It comes to him as he's stripping off his dirty clothes and tossing them and his towel on a peg, stepping under the spout of the shower and pulling the rope to spill the lukewarm water over his head. It runs in little rivers over his chest, his back, trickles down his hips and thighs and patters on the cement floor, and as he tilts his head back and closes his eyes into it, he thinks about how _careful_ Rick was with her right after. How he wasn't rough, then. He kissed her. Stroked her hair and whispered things to her. He was almost gentle. She was a come-smeared mess, face streaked with spit and tears and his own cooling semen, but Rick wasn't calling her names anymore. Not bad ones.

_Oh, baby girl, that's so sweet._

So not Beth sleeping it off alone in her cell, and not Rick doing the same in his, or outside at work in the early morning. Instead the two of them, wrapped up in each other, legs tangled, Rick’s arms folded around her and her head tucked under his chin, her cheek against his bare chest. His fingers combed into her cascade of cornsilk hair. Her pretty face wiped clean, long lashes resting just above her cheekbone.

Rick’s cock swelling, lengthening. Pressing with lazy hunger into her lower belly.

He was feeling marginally less hungover, but every single muscle in his body tightens as his stomach flips over.

No. He's not going to _do_ _this_. It's not his fucking _business_ and it never was. Whatever she and Rick are doing, whatever last night was, it's between them, it's their thing, he was an aberration, he needs to steer as far clear as possible, because nothing good can possibly come of him doing anything else. He has to put it the hell _away_.

He's not going to think about her mouth. Plump, wet lips. _Cocksucker lips,_ Merle would have called them. Those lips parting, flicker of her little pink tongue. Lips stretched around him, gleaming, her big doe eyes shining as she gazed up at him. Glide of that wicked tongue across the underside of his shaft, the way it felt like she was making it dance for him. The slurping noises as he rutted in her, the drool dripping in long strands from her chin, the gagging sobs he forced out of her as he bottomed out over and over against the back of her throat. Felt so fucking good, and yeah, Merle, okay, _you win,_ it wasn't just the bare fact of how it felt. Wasn't just that at all.

He's biting the insides of his lips so hard he tastes tangy copper. It was her tears. Yes. That choking and her tears and Rick calling her a _whore_ and a _slut_ \- and not because she hated it. Not because they were hurting her.

That big smile on her face after.

She asked for it. _She loved it._

He doesn't have to open his eyes and look down to know that he has his stiffening cock in his fist now, even if the rest of him is going numb. Not cold, but as if he's running away from himself, like a wretched remix of how he's learned to handle pain. When it's all too much to face, you simply take yourself out of the equation. You make yourself not matter.

But this does matter.

He _is_ cold, he's suddenly aware. He's shivering. Good, that makes this easier; he releases his wilting dick with a violent twitch of his hand, turns sharply toward the wall. Wash up, get the fuck out of here. Find something else to do. Find some other way to occupy himself, because this is impending disaster, and no one is going to come riding to his rescue. He plucks the soap off the wooden shelf they've affixed to the wall for that purpose, works it into a thin lather, scrubs himself briskly with his hands - practically raking his nails over himself, marking his skin in angry lines. Goes over his teeth with the same briskness. Takes a minimal amount of time to rinse off, dries himself in the same way. Normally he dislikes being naked anywhere he might be seen as a matter of course, and the showers are semi-communal, so rushing through this process is normal for him, but now he's nearly frantic, and as he pulls on his clothes, he's still damp.

Jesus, he's edging close to _panic_.

He pauses long enough to lace up his boots and no longer than that, straightens and heads out from behind the main partition with swift, determined strides-

Swift determination that slams him straight into her.

Of _course_ it's her. His stomach plunges into the floor even as he's stepping back, dropping yesterday’s clothes and his towel and everything else as he grips her upper arms to steady her, mouth open to ask out of pure instinct if she's all right. And she utterly silences him with what he sees on her face as she tips it back to stare up at him, those big doe eyes, flushed cheeks and plump lips, so pretty and sweet that he wants to drop to his knees and implore her pardon.

She doesn't give him a chance to do anything. She places her hand on the center of his chest, licks her lips - and he sees that she's nervous. She's shaken too, not badly but unmistakably, and she's searching for her own words. He takes that as a mercy; he's lost regarding what his would be. And presently she finds them. Something in her face sets as she opens her mouth.

She's made some kind of decision.

“You doin’ anything right now?”

Wordless, he shakes his head. No. No, he has no plans to do anything ever again. He figured he would work that part out when he had to.

“Good.” She jerks her head to the left. “Meet me in the block we just cleared out? Ten minutes.”

He thinks he might be nodding. The fact is, regardless of how unbelievably stupid this choice might be, he has no clue what else he would do in this situation. Denying her… How would he even _begin_ to do that? How would that even _work?_ If he even wanted to - and he doesn't want to deny her, is the thing. He doesn't want to say no.

She looks at him like she is now and he can't imagine ever saying no. He can't imagine ever giving her anything but exactly what she wants, as soon as humanly possible.

“Good.” Hand still on his chest, small and warm through the aged fabric of his shirt. A tiny smile is playing around the corners of her mouth, the hints of a curve, and it's delightful, and as all the moisture drains from his throat, she pushes up on the toes of her boots and presses her plump lips to his cheek. Quick. There and gone again.

She scorches him, and in seconds his entire face is blazing.

Somehow he pulls in a breath, and then she's stepping back, her small warm hand falling to her side, but the smile remains, even as she turns to go. And with a soft shudder, he's certain that it's not an innocent smile.

Not even remotely.

_Whoo, brother._ Merle sounds almost admiring. _Got yourself a little hellcat here, dontcha? Got yourself a bad girl in a good girl’s skin. You lucky sonuvabitch._

He wants to tear his own hair out. Her hair flips over her shoulder as she walks away, cornsilk glowing in the morning light.

Cornsilk clenched in his fist as he pumps his dick into her and yanks her face up to receive his come.

“See ya then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I know this is kind of a WHY DID YOU STOP THERE situation, but I have the next chapter planned right down to the, uh, positions, so hopefully it shouldn't take me too long to get it written and posted.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beyond nervous but unable to say no, Daryl agrees to meet Beth in the empty cell block. He has no idea what to expect. But he's not done not being able to say no to her, and it's not like, given what she's proposing, he even wants to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was like "ugh I can't write this fic anymore" and then I wrote the whole chapter in basically a day, so apparently I should think things like that more often. 
> 
> Also this fic keeps getting bigger and I'm annoyed at it because I really do have enough WIPs going simultaneously right now. 
> 
> ❤️

_See ya then._

Feels like a promise. Feels like a threat. Except no; couldn't be. She's such a sweet girl, she wouldn't threaten him. That's not what this is. She's not angry, she's not even vaguely distressed as far as he can tell - and somehow that makes Daryl more uncomfortable than he imagines her anger might be, because it makes no damn _sense_.

She really did seem to enjoy it, to _want_ it, but he has no idea how that's possible. And right now he wants to discuss it about as much as he wants to take a stroll through a walker herd.

 _Maybe she ain't interested in_ discussion, _little brother,_ Merle drawls. _Maybe she's interested in somethin’ else you can give her. Give it to her nice and long and hard._

He grits his teeth. Christ, shut the fuck _up_.

He didn't sign on for any of this.

_Sure you did._

Anyway, he couldn't say no to her before and he doesn't seem to be able to say no now. Because in ten minutes he's exactly where she told him him be: in the neighboring block they recently cleared in order to allow everyone a little more breathing room but where no one is yet making a home. It's empty, and it's also bright and airy, the sun hitting the high windows straight on and scattering down through dancing motes of dust.

He stands in the middle of the place, hands in his pockets, feeling as awkward as he think he ever has, and part of him is sincerely praying that she'll change her mind, whatever she _has_ in mind, and not show up. Allow him to go about the business of loathing himself, at which he's become quite the expert through long years of dedicated practice.

But no. Of course he's not that lucky. Because here she comes, the sun catching her hair and suffusing it with a golden glow - cliché but it's true - and making her skin appear slightly flushed. He feels sure she would be wonderfully warm to the touch.

Not the sun. She _is_ flushed.

He stands very still. She reaches him, stops in front of him - God, she's really close - and once again he notices her own nervousness. Not all that intense, not all that obvious, but it's there. And he would feel like shit even more than he does, except he's certain the nervousness isn't because _he's_ making her nervous.

She's nervous because… because of everything. Because of that fact that she's here at all, talking to him.

She gives him a tiny smile, and he battles back the urge to fall over, his stomach leaping into his throat. “Hi.”

He's expecting to not be able to say anything. But somehow he manages his own croaked “Hi,” and then all at once his attention shifts from the simple fact of her to what she's wearing. Nothing out of the ordinary for her, nothing she doesn't wear as a matter of course, but her jeans are so tight over her hips and thighs and ass, and the neckline of her tank top is scooped low, and she doesn't have much in the way of tits but he can still make out the tops of their full little curves, and wonders how they would feel cupped in his palms.

He's looking at this sweet girl and he's imagining her naked like a piece of meat for him to devour. He swallows and doesn't turn away, though it's a near thing.

She lifts a hand, bites her thumbnail, and it's fucking adorable. “I just…” She drifts off at the last word, frowning, then pushes ahead. “I just wanted to, um, talk. About last night. If-if you want.”

No. He does not want. Wordlessly, he nods. What the fucking hell is he _doing_.

He's showing her some goddamn _respect_. That's what the hell he’s doing.

“I think maybe you're worried. Like… I dunno. You seem worried.” She lets out a soft laugh, drops her hand. “I know it was weird, I guess you didn't expect to see that. I never… I never did anythin’ like that. Did you?”

Slowly, he shakes his head.

“Oh.” A deeper flush creeps up her neck into her cheeks and ears. He's sure that's not what she suspected she would hear, and mortification trickles into him. He's not mad at her, God, no, but.

_Is that what you think of me?_

If that's genuinely true, if that's something she believed about him, he might actually have to die.

“It, um.” Another small laugh. “Don't freak out or anythin’, but that was my, y’know, first time.”

He gapes at her, uncomprehending. Because how. How the fuck can that have been her _first time?_ So far as he knows, she's at _least_ seventeen, probably older. She would surely have lost it before now. And there's sure as shit no way that, even if she hadn't, she would have given it up to Rick fucking Grimes in a dirty basement room, bent over with her pretty skirt rucked up around her waist, being called a _filthy slut,_ and letting Daryl rut into her mouth until he came all over her fucking _face_.

Not because he would think less of her, but because… Jesus. That's just not her. That's not anything like her. She wouldn't. She wouldn't want that. She would want something better.

Nevertheless.

So he says the one thing he can think to say - a question, the one answer he cares about right now. What seems appropriate. What seems like something he needs to know before anything else happens here.

Still in a low croak: “Y’alright?”

Her turn to stare at him. Then she ducks her head and her laugh is louder and richer - and pleased. Maybe the slightest bit embarrassed, but pleased with him. Pleased that he asked.

Warmth floods into him. He doesn't get it, but it's good. It feels better.

“Yeah.” She lifts her head, meets his eyes. Hers are glittering. “Yeah, I'm alright. Daryl, I _liked_ it. Doin’… that, with you. I liked it a lot.” She steps forward, clearly cautious, but when he doesn't spook, she steps again. He hasn't the first clue why he's _not_ spooking, but he isn't. Not even when she lays her hands against his chest and tilts her head back to gaze up at him, all of her glowing and her full lips parted.

_Cocksucker lips._

“Did you?” Almost a whisper. She's nervous again. “Did you like it? It's okay if you didn't,” she adds, a bit hastily. “You can tell me, it's fine. It won't hurt my feelings or anythin’.”

_Be honest with her, you piece of shit. If you do nothing else right in your life, if you fail at literally everything else you do, at least be honest with her now._

“Yeah,” he breathes. “I did.”

This time she smiles fit to split her face in half, _happy,_ and there's relief in that smile. If she was nervous before, she isn't anymore, at least not enough to matter, and before he can do or say anything else, she's pushing up on her toes and pressing her lips lightly against his.

Her lips. Soft, supple, and they seem to fit so bizarrely well over his own, and it hits him that she's had those lips wrapped around his fucking dick but he never kissed her. Never did anything like this with her at all. Now he stiffens as she kisses him, rigid and completely at a loss, because he's done this much and he knows how it works but with her, like this…

It feels so different.

Then those soft lips part and her tongue traces the seam of his, barely any pressure at all, and he opens to her like she's forced him except with an eagerness that shocks him - the sheer comedy that a goddamn _kiss_ could shock him at this point - and allows her in.

She hesitates, stiffening a little herself, but it only lasts a second or two, and after that she's inside him, licking into him, her tongue sliding over his teeth and curling against his, and that's when he grips her waist with one hand and reaches up with the other, cups her jaw and angles her up to him, pushes back into her with a deep groan. She echoes it, higher and breathier, her hands clenching his shirt into folds and clinging to him, and he kisses her so _hard,_ harder than he thinks he's ever kissed anyone, and it feels so fucking good.

It feels so perfect.

He realizes his dick is swelling when she presses the full length of her body against him, gasping against his mouth, and rolls her hips in a slow wave. He groans again, clasps her, thrusts with his tongue and thinks _you could do this, you could do this to her but not with your tongue, she_ wants _you to,_ and she pulls back slightly, plunges one hand between them and cups the bulge in his jeans, kneading with the heel of her palm and sending a wave of dizziness lurching through his head.

He feels her smile, hears it in her voice. “You wanna do it again?”

His groan is thicker, more helpless, and he wishes so much that there was a wall at his back that he could sag against, because every second she works his cock like this it's harder to remain standing. And now she's asking him this, offering him this, and there's only one honest answer.

 _Fuck’s sake._ Merle sounds somewhere between amused and exasperated. _You ain't no monster, brother. You're a horny motherfucker with a hot little piece of ass throwin’ her pussy at you, and it's only natural you wanna take advantage._

_So go on ahead._

“Yeah.” He chokes out the word, the aching need overwhelming the last of his fear. Need between his legs… and not just there. It's heavy in his chest, a clenched fist small and delicate like hers, and though it hurts it's sweet in a way he can't hope to define. “Fuck, yeah. I do.”

“Good.”

He has time to blink, suck in a breath, and then she's pushing him stumbling backward until his shoulders collide with a set of bars, and she wriggles easily free of his grasp and drops swiftly to her knees.

He watches her, rapt and still half disbelieving, as she uses both hands to stroke him through his jeans, and even though she's clumsy, obviously inexperienced, he couldn't possibly give any less of a fuck. It's _amazing,_ pleasure rippling through him, and he abruptly worries that he won't be able to last, might come right here in his fucking pants, and it's only worse when she raises her eyes without a pause, wetting her lips with a swipe of her pink tongue.

That _tongue_.

“I want you in my mouth,” she breathes. “I wanna suck you, Daryl. Can I? Please?”

No more shyness. Only bright-eyed earnestness. Close to weirdly innocent. In the back of his mind, Merle chuckles.

He can't answer aloud now. No chance in hell of locating the simplest words. So he merely nods, and she starts to unzip him.

Back to watching her. She's taking him apart. He might be floating feet above his body, though he could still never look down at anything but her. Her shining hair pulled back in her customary ponytail - downright convenient, that is - and the roses in her cheeks, her incredible mouth… and the way she's looking at him exactly the way he's looking at her, or so much like it, like he's fascinating. Like she can hardly believe it, what she has, as she nudges her fingers into his fly, curls them around his shaft and draws him out.

Staring at his exposed cock, so hard, bobbing slightly, his foreskin stretched tight and the head above it dark pink and glistening with precome. Practically dripping.

God, he wants her so fucking bad.

“I liked how you taste,” she murmurs, glances up at him as she shifts her grip, holding him around the base, her other hand steadying herself on his hip. She quirks a smile. “It's not like Rick. It's not better, it's just different.” Having delivered this information - which he regards with utter bewilderment - she leans in, her tongue slipping past her lips, and gives him a lick.

Quick little cat lap. But his eyes roll up, and he wants to watch her so much but he can't; his head lolls back and knocks against the bars, and he doesn't even notice the pain, because she's _licking him,_ licking him like he's a goddamn popsicle - yet another cliché but fuck it, it really _is_ like that - swiping up the underside of his shaft, running her lips up and down, swirling around the head, nudging the tip of her tongue against his slit. Curving her lips around him and sliding down and down, hollowing her cheeks as she sucks. And she's moaning, she's making these unbelievable _sounds,_ shit like out of a porno except it's nothing like that at all because not a bit of her enthusiasm is faked - and there's nothing ugly about this. There's nothing grotesque. He's not making her do it. She's not making herself.

She's exactly where she wants to be, doing exactly what she wants to do. He can tell. He's never known Beth Greene to fake anything. Not this way.

He could hold the sides of her head, senses also that she not only wouldn't mind but might like it very much if he did that, but he doesn't. He grips the bars behind him with trembling hands and lets her set the course all by herself, leaves it totally up to her how deep and how fast. Manages to watch her for brief periods until he can't take it anymore and his eyes squeeze shut, his jaw set and his teeth bared. He lasted, still thinks he might be able to for a bit longer, but suddenly that's not true anymore and he's teetering on the edge. Finally he does grope for her head, frantic, hissing.

“ _Fuck,_ Beth- I'm _close,_ I'm gonna-”

She leans abruptly backward, his dick slipping out of her mouth with a _pop,_ and he whines, confused and shuddering and fumbling at her - and shit, what if he's done something wrong after all?

What if she doesn't want to anymore?

But she's smiling again, shaking her head, and she doesn't _seem_ upset. She doesn't _seem_ to be disliking anything he's done or hasn't done. She gives him a long stroke with her hand, base to head, and he quivers.

“I don't want you to come like this,” she says, her voice low and husky and musical. No shy hesitation whatsoever. “I want you to fuck me.”

Okay.

It's a blur. He finds her hand when she reaches for him and he holds on, tugs her to her feet. She scrambles a bit, pulling her shirt over her head and letting it fall, grinning and laughing as she swings around him and bends and hops, hauling off her boots, straightening and doing her own fumbling at her fly and waistband. It's like he blinks and she’s completely naked, kicking her panties away and pressing herself back against the bars.

And he _is_ looking at her like a goddamn piece of meat, panting like a dog, unashamed and unapologetic, out of his fucking mind just as much as last night and not giving the tiniest shit. She spreads her legs for him as he reaches between them - and shit, she's absolutely _soaked,_ her juices clumping her dark blond pubic hair and gleaming on the protruding and swollen lips of her pussy.

“Yeah,” she gasps, “God, Daryl, _please,_ ” and he obliges, pressing a single finger into her, the squelch a pulse of searing heat straight to his cock, and she stretches up and curls her hands around the bars and whimpers his name.

It's blowing his fucking mind. Merle would say that it's _just a damn pussy,_ that sure, some deliver better overall experiences than others but ultimately they’re all pretty much the same - and it's not like Daryl even has a huge variety of experience on that front - but she feels absolutely incredible, so hot and wet and tightening around him when he pushes deeper and curls his finger, exploring. Watching her face, watching the effect of what he does, watching and stunned that he can _do_ this to her, make her look like this, like she can barely keep hold of herself. Like she might tumble up to the fucking ceiling if she lets go.

“Please.” It's beyond his understanding that he could ever have doubted that she wants this. “Oh- God- Daryl, oh my _God,_ please…”

He couldn't say no to her when she asked him to meet her here. He couldn't possibly say no to her now even if he wanted to. And he doesn't worry about mechanics, doesn't spend a second on considering how they might do this; he curves his hands around and beneath her ass and hoists her up, and she wraps her legs around his waist and laughs once more.

His pants are sagging low on his hips, nothing between him and her, but he still has to maneuver a hand quickly between them, line himself up, and when he feels the head of his cock pushing into her entrance, he grabs her again, steadies her, shoves her against the bars and buries himself in her.

She cries out, sounds near pain, and panic twists at him; all over again he's thinking _first time,_ and sure, he saw Rick _fuckin’ the shit outta her_ as Merle would charmingly put it but that doesn't mean she can't be hurt if he goes too hard and too fast. But he leans back enough to look at her and the expression on her face…

No way in hell is that pain.

“It's good.” She bites her lip, cords standing out in her neck, the muscles in her arms straining. Sometimes he forgets how strong she is. “It's so good, Christ, don't you stop, don't you _dare-_ ”

He doesn't stop. He withdraws, half lifts her, plunges into her again, punching another cry out of her - and _shit,_ it's echoing off the walls, what if someone hears them, but only part of him cares about that anymore. The rest of him is focused only on watching her as he fucks her, deep, awkward thrusts that make her features tighten and loosen every time he bottoms out. Her head falls back against the bars just like his did, and she lets out hard grunts that bleed into moans with the impact of his body. This is not gentle. This is not careful. The idea that he could really hurt her is still horrifying, but it's also increasingly remote, and what's becoming clear to him beneath the sharp pulses of pleasure - what should have been clear to him from the beginning - is that to a point, she would very likely _welcome_ being hurt by him.

He has no idea what to do with that information.

Right now he's doing nothing, nothing except letting go and being rough with her, his blunt nails digging into her upper thighs and leaning in, his brow against hers and his teeth bare against her cheekbone. She releases the bars with one hand and hooks her arm around his neck, drags herself in to kiss him, and he's not startled when she sucks his bottom lip into her mouth and bites. He growls and nips her right back, scraping her jaw with his teeth; he's never in his _life_ been like this with a woman, never would have imagined he would want to be, could _bear_ to be, but here he is, pounding her into the bars and biting at her like a fucking animal.

It's like that. It's exactly like that. He doesn't have to worry about anything. They're both animals.

Animals don't worry. They just _do_.

Like an animal, he's not saying anything, all words long ago deserted him in favor of breathless growls, but in his mind he hears Rick’s voice, so loud and so clear that for a jittery adrenaline-soaked second he's sure Rick is standing behind him.

 _Yeah, like that. Fuck her, Daryl. Jesus, give it to her. Give it_ all _to her. Give this little slut what she's got coming._

Rick, standing so close. Watching.

Reaching out to touch him.

He almost realizes too late. It bursts from the base of his spine all the way up to his brain and he releases her and wrenches himself backward and out of her, and her legs unwind themselves in a clumsy stumble as he braces himself against the bars, grips his cock, and jerks his climax out, shuddering and spurting come onto her bush and lower belly, a few drops on her thighs. He watches this happen like he's been watching everything else: in a daze that's nevertheless marked by extreme clarity, the most vivid dream he's ever had.

The sheen of sweat on her flushed skin. The streaks of his come. He gazes at her, entranced, as she lowers her hand and trails her fingers through it.

Beautiful.

Except now he has no idea what to do. Bit by bit the haze is lifting, and now he feels vaguely ridiculous, standing here breathing like he's been running, with his pants hanging around his knees and his softening dick sticky in his fist. She had a good time, he gathers, maybe a _really_ good time, but it's not outside the realm of possibility that she'll consider this transaction concluded, gather up her clothes and leave him.

But as yet she's not doing either of those things. She's just standing there on shaky legs, playing idly with the semen on her skin, her head cocked and a dreamy little smile pulling at her mouth. She reaches up with her other hand and strokes his hair back from his face.

She still looks happy.

“That was good,” she murmurs. “Thank you.”

He comes dangerously close to exploding into hysterical laughter. Because the idea that _she_ would be thanking _him_ is comically ludicrous. That even if she enjoyed herself, she would consider this as something he gave to her, that she was privileged to get.

Although. She asked him. This entire time, she's been asking him, begging him to do what he did to her. Over and over, she said _please_.

He doesn't feel like he's given her anywhere near enough.

He releases his dick and wipes his hand on his jeans as he pulls them up, brisk about it - not paying all that much attention anymore. He's inconsequential. This is about _her,_ and if for some inexplicable reason she wants to do this with him, he's going to make _damn_ sure she doesn't walk away unsatisfied.

“You didn't come,” he breathes.

She blinks, looks faintly surprised. As if that hadn't even occurred to her. “So what?”

“So-” He stops dead, nonplussed. That is not a response he was prepared for. Why the fuck _wouldn’t_ it have occurred to her? Isn't that what she would _want?_ Isn't that the whole _point?_

Is it even remotely possible that, for her, it's not?

“‘cause you-” He stammers, staggers into the only words he can think of. “You _should_.”

“Oh.” She breathes a laugh, all bemusement, and leans back against the bars. And she's so fucking gorgeous, it's not _fair:_ her cornsilk hair come loose from her ponytail and cascading all around her shoulders, the gleam of sweat lingering on her skin, the gentle swell of her hips, her perfect little tits capped with their perfect pink nipples, her powerful legs - and her pussy, her lips still visible and still glistening wet, more wet on the insides of her thighs.

He's never done this, this thing he's now sure he wants to do for her. But by this point, if he fucks it all up, he trusts her to be kind to him.

“I wanna eat you out.”

“I.” She continues to not look surprised, not exactly, but she's closer to it than she was. She regards him with that same bemusement, pushing a hand into her hair. “What?”

“You heard me.” He feels like he's looming. Not intimidating, or that's not what he wants, but he _does_ want to do this, all at once he wants it more than anything, and when a little shiver runs through her it's as if it runs into him. “I wanna eat your pussy.” Pause. He's still uncertain, and he fucking sucks at pretending he's not, so he won't bother. “I wanna make you come.”

Her bemusement fades, and in its place is that sweet smile, the one that pretty much makes his knees buckle. Which is fine, which works out perfectly, because as soon as she nods he goes down on his knees, hands framing her hips and his face so close to her.

He'd be lying his ass off if he tried to say he's not nervous. If he claimed that some small part of him isn't scared shitless. Because she would be kind to him if he fucked up, but he wants so much _not_ to fuck up, because she's extraordinary, she's utterly wonderful, and this matters. She made him feel so good. She made him feel better than he can remember feeling in a long fucking time. He's not confident he's _ever_ felt like she made him feel.

Like she's making him feel now.

For a fraction of a second he considers telling her that this is new ground to him, that he has no idea what he's doing, and then he thinks _fuck it_ and leans in, nudges his thumbs between her inner and outer lips, and parts her as she parts her legs for him.

For fuck’s sake, it's not like he's never seen a pussy before, but God’s honest truth is that he's never seen one in this proximity, and for another second or two he's struck motionless. Just staring. Because he has no idea why, could never explain it to anyone including himself, but it's beautiful. The dark folds of her labia, the flashes of lighter pink between them, the lines of it and the way it arches, somehow graceful, up to the tiny bud of her clit, all wreathed in the coarse curls of her hair. So wet, so slick, so _pretty,_ pretty as she is, and he's not thinking at all as he closes the last of the distance and flicks his tongue against her.

She gasps, shudders, and distantly he feels her fingers combing into his hair as he does it again, bolder, licking at her clit before sealing his lips over it and giving it the lightest suction.

So after that he's pretty sure he's doing all right.

He doesn't worry about it. He simply explores. The way she's formed seems to be almost guiding him, and he moves his tongue to whatever feels right, adjusting as she gently applies pressure to his head, turning him where she wants him, showing him when he's doing especially well by her fluttery moans and strained versions of his name - and he pays very careful attention to that. He laps more roughly at her lips, pulls them into his mouth and sucks them too, licks in a long pass all around them, returns to her clit. He delicately pushes her labia apart and presses in with his tongue, finding her entrance, scoops out her juices as they flow and swallows. It's delicious. It's indescribable, a kind of tangy salt-sweet like nothing else he's ever tasted, and he laps it up, groaning to match her for volume.

If he could get hard again this soon, he would be busting through his fucking fly.

That's not important. What's important are the sounds he's drawing out of her, the way her fingers are tightening as they tangle in his hair, her nails scratching along his scalp and sending bright tingles down his spine. He finally settles solely on her clit, senses that's best for her now, and licks her in rapid little circles, flicking it from side to side. He's sure he's doing fine but it still feels slightly awkward, still feels like he could maybe be doing better, like even if he's good now there's room for improvement.

And then it occurs to him that she might give him a chance at that.

Might very well, given how she's responding, slinging one leg over his shoulder and spreading herself wide, both hands cupping the back of his head and holding him in place as she whines _oh my God, that's perfect, right there, that’s, oh,_ shit, _Daryl, harder harderharderYES-_

He looks up in time to see her throwing her head back, every muscle tense, her mouth fallen open as she convulses against him, and he holds onto her and keeps frantically licking, the image of drinking from her like a cup, until she's shoving at his head and gasping for him to stop, stop, _it's too much._

He stops. He doesn't want to, but he does. Eyes closed, he leans into her, his forehead pressed against her hipbone and his lips grazing her bush, and as she sighs and begins to relax, he kisses her there.

Quiet, except for her heaving, trembling breaths and his pulse pounding in his ears.

This morning, he was horrified by himself, but even more than that, he was struggling to believe it happened at all. He was struggling to get his head around the idea that he could _do_ that, that he ever would, that he would like it as much as he did. It wasn't just about the horror. It was about how it felt so unreal.

Still does.

This, though? This is something he wants to believe.

She continues combing her fingers through his hair, almost as if she's trying to soothe him, until the stiffness in his knees is too much to ignore any longer and he levers himself to his feet. She looks up at him, once more wearing that dreamy expression, wraps her arms around his waist and lays her head against his chest. Though it maybe shouldn't, it takes him by surprise, and it's a few seconds before he circles his own arms loosely around her.

It just seems so weird. She's completely naked and he's fully clothed, and that's a strange enough contrast, but it's also such an innocent thing, holding him like this and being held. It's a _hug_. It might as well be chaste, like he didn't just fuck her, like he didn't just lick her pussy until she came all over his face. She could hug anyone.

No. Not anyone. Not like this.

After another few moments - during which he manages to pull her in a little more firmly, the warm smallness of her and how she fits against him - she lifts her head and brushes her lips against his jaw, that delightful curve of a smile. “You made me feel so good, Daryl.” She raises her hands to frame his face, and when she meets his eyes her own are bright. Brilliant. “That was…” Another iteration of that soft, sweet laugh, and her smile turns both thoughtful and slightly bashful. “That was fun. A lotta fun.”

 _Fun_. He never ever in a million fucking years would have attached that term to sex. But she's absolutely right. It was fun. Once he got out of his own way, she wasn't the only one enjoying herself.

Maybe that's okay.

“You should go now, though.” She strokes her thumbs over his cheeks, pushes up on her toes and kisses him, light but lingering. The tiniest flick of her tongue, and he realizes she can probably taste herself. And he _does_ like that. “Think if anyone saw us like this it would be kinda hard to explain.”

 _Oh_.

Yeah. Right. He nods and steps away from her, but it takes more effort than he would have preferred, and he hopes she doesn't see it. Hopes she doesn't see that the emotion balling up beneath his diaphragm is dangerously close to disappointment.

Not in her. He doesn't blame her. Of course she wouldn't want anyone to know about this. Of course she would want to keep it a secret. How the fuck would it _look,_ for her? What the hell else could he have reasonably expected?

But it still hurts. He thinks about being someone’s _dirty little secret,_ and it doesn't feel good.

Either he fails to hide it well enough, or she's simply too perceptive for him to hide in the first place. Because her brow furrows and she reaches for him again, for his face, and the way she touches him…

No one has ever touched him like that. Never in his fucking life.

Like she doesn't want to stop.

“It's just that… I don't think people would get it. They might look at you and…” She exhales, shakes her head. “I don't want them thinkin’ that way about you. Y’know? I don't want that.” She pauses, gnawing at her bottom lip - still swollen from his kisses, Jesus Christ - and then: “I don't want Daddy gettin’ mad at you.”

So that's different. He's not sure he could articulate quite how, but it is.

Doesn't make him feel a whole lot better, but it is.

“I wanna do this again. If you wanna.” Thumb against his lips. “I wanna do more than this.”

 _God, yes,_ a voice inside him yells - not Merle. Because he considers a future wherein he never does this with her again, and although it's not like he would die or whatever…

“Yeah,” he whispers. “Me too.”

He's most of the way to the door of the cell block before the question occurs to him, and before he can stop himself he halts and turns back to her, the words lined up behind his teeth and ready to spill.

They don't. She's in the middle of pulling on her jeans, looking back at him, quizzical.

He wonders what she sees.

“What?”

He opens his mouth, closes it - gives his head a single shake. “Nothin’.”

“Alright.” But he's fairly certain she doesn't believe him. And as he walks away, it's still got its teeth in him and doesn't seem inclined to let go. Sooner or later, he'll have to know.

_What about Rick?_

It's not his business. Except in one respect, it very much is. Because when she said _I wanna do this again_ and he said _me too,_ his thoughts went a good bit further than this cell block.

_What about Rick… and me?_


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stunned and shaken, Rick faces his own Morning After. But Beth isn't going to let him get through the day without clarifying a few things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still struggling with writing, still determined to not let it beat me. This is somewhat of an interlude from the filth to address Rick's state of mind, but don't worry: in all likelihood we'll be getting back into it in the next chapter. Which I'll try to write soon. 
> 
> Comments are very nice and somewhat reassuring. 
> 
> ❤️

Rick is awake before sunrise.

So he sleeps for, at best, an hour or so, and when sleep kicks him out of itself like a drunk getting evicted after last call, he can't stay in his bunk. Can't stay in his cell. It's too quiet, too dim and therefore too primed for his own imagination’s highlight reels of the horrendous things he spent his evening doing. Most of all, least bearable, he brought her smell in with him, clinging to his skin and his clothes - her sweat, her tears, her fucking pussy.

The tight wet heaven that is her pussy.

He drags on cleanish clothes and prays that'll be enough. Of course it's not, but he has to at least try.

Out of the block, out the door and down the short flight of steps onto the wide concrete lot that borders the grassy yard. Passing the water barrels, the tarp-shaded open air kitchen. Soon people will be out here making breakfast, organizing tasks, preparing for the day, but for now he's alone and it's quiet, and that's a mercy.

Even if he has to be alone with himself.

As yet the sun is more a hint of it itself than anything else, casting the lot and the grass and the trees beyond the fence in varying shades of gray. The pigs are grunting to themselves in their pen. In the distance, low and somehow sleepy, the periodic groans and hisses of the few walkers gathered against the chainlink.

He stands in the yard and watches them for a while as they press and grope at the fences, his mind injecting frustration into their growls. Only occasionally these days does the buildup become something that needs urgent dealing-with, but he can imagine a future in which it might be a genuine issue on the regular. No sense in borrowing trouble, but. Worth considering.

Worth considering right now because it distracts him from the thought of Beth Greene’s ass jiggling as he pounds into her, her swollen lips sliding up and down the spit-shined skin of Daryl’s cock.

He squeezes his eyes shut and clenches his jaw so fiercely that his teeth grind. Tries to force his blood to maintain its normal route through his veins with sheer force of will.

Then, as the sunlight begins to seep through the trees, he fetches a pair of work gloves and one of the spear-poles they use for the walkers and goes to deal with them.

~

How can he face Hershel? Turns out, in the few minutes they have to speak to each other about medical supplies, it's not actually that much of a task. What he does is that he fakes it, which he has some degree of experience with. Locks those nasty, seething parts of himself with their nasty seething images away behind a wall he's used before, an old reliable structure, and he's pretty sure he puts up a passable impression that everything is fine. Normal. What happened did not happen. What he did, he did not do. He's responsible. A family man. A goddamn pillar of the community, taking up a hoe and going out to work the ground until his arms are trembling and he's mopping sweat off his brow.

Work gives him cover for that.

Sweet girl has him so fucked up.

Except no. That's completely unfair. Staring down at the dirt caked on his boots, the sharp smell of dust and torn up roots, he hacks the truth at himself like the head of the hoe into the ground: he can't blame her for a single part of this. It's all him. Him and what it turns out he's capable of, this beast that was, until a few days ago, sleeping inside him. Innocuous and unnoticed. Harmless.

Now that beast is ravishing a virginal teenager, and all he can think about is when he might get to do it again.

_Tear that cute little ass up._

An hour or so after noon, sitting in the shade with his elbows on his bent knees and his sweaty handkerchief dangling loosely from one hand, he sees Daryl rolling his bike toward the gate. Daryl doesn't look up, and that's something for which Rick is profoundly thankful. He's hugging the building and far enough in the shade that he might not be that visible, but even so.

If Beth is a struggle to mentally approach right now, Daryl is just about impossible.

This is not sustainable. What the fuck has he _done_.

He leans his head back against the brick and presses the heels of his palms against his eyes, and too late he realizes that he's probably given himself a goddamn raccoon mask of dirt. Which, frankly, would be sort of appropriate. Creature who comes out in the dead of night, steals.

Roots around in trash.

If he could grab her, drag her into a dark corner and bend her over and fuck her until she's crying, he would probably feel better.

~

So of course he does see her.

Coming in that evening. Passing the kitchen, his stomach makes a desperate lunge sideways and he realizes that he hasn't eaten all day, can't even remember eating anything that morning. His body simply hadn't bothered with hunger. But now he can't ignore it anymore, and a few feet from the door he's about to turn on his heel, head back and see what he can scrape together and wolf down, and there she is, stopped in her tracks at the top of the steps and gazing silently down at him. The low sun catches her hair, lights up every strand in deep gold that flows down over her shoulder, gilds the outer curve of her cheek. The rest of her face is mostly hidden, but he can feel the butterfly-pressure of her eyes on him.

Those maddeningly tight jeans. Tank top that manages to be both loose and clingy. The barest outlines of her small breasts just visible, and he looks at them and is so overwhelmed by the memory of them cupped in his rough palms that he can hardly breathe.

Throat dry. Lips dry. She's all warm and wet inside. Blood is rushing furiously into his cock and there's no way he can stop it.

Then she's moving, descending to him step by unhurried step, and what he's overwhelmed by is how effortlessly graceful she seems, casual about it like it’s nothing she's ever considered. Like she has no idea. Was she always like this and he merely never saw it? Or is it new?

Once again, he thinks it and couldn't possibly think anything else: she's not just pretty and she's not just cute. Those words are not adequate.

She's beautiful.

He stays where he is, motionless, hands hanging numb at his sides. He remains that way when she reaches him and stops. She's very close. He can smell her, strong as he smelled her pussy in his cell - soap and sweat, a little smoke from the cooking fires, and that indescribable scent that he recognizes as a clean baby.

Easy enough to get Carl to look after Judith, but she can be back in his cell with him tonight, and maybe that'll keep him honest.

She takes care of his daughter. She could _be_ his daughter.

_You sick fuck._

But he's not walking away. Not doing what he should be doing and giving her a quick nod, maybe a faint smile, passing her by. The way he used to, before he lost his mind to her. Before he allowed his Dr. Jekyll to morph into a Mr. Hyde he barely recognizes as himself.

Not doing what he should be doing - which might just be what's _normal_ now.

She doesn't speak. It occurs to him that maybe she won't, not first. It occurs to him that maybe he and she are in full view of anyone and everyone, that they're being watched. That everything he does is open to question and speculation. That there's a fucking spotlight on him, the kind prison guards use to catch inmates attempting an escape, and the spotlight is her eyes.

It's remotely possible that she has magical powers, because she reads his mind, speaks low and with the potential of a smile in her voice.

“No one’s watchin’ us.”

_Oh_. Thank Christ. Except he doesn't feel any less disturbed. Feels even worse when she reaches out and touches his hand - his filthy fucking hand, smeared with dirt, black under the nails - and inclines her head toward the door. “Come in with me for a sec?”

_Don't_. God, don't, just don't, his stomach utterly forgotten hunger and plunging toward his feet. He's horribly confident that the only thing keeping the monster in him under control is the judgment of everyone else, the norms he's gleefully violating under cover of cement and darkness, and the consequences if he's discovered. If they can't see him…

Fuck knows what he'll do.

But she's walking back toward the stairs, and - helpless in the face of himself - he's following.

~

Immediately on the other side of the door, the entryway is dim, lit only after it turns a sharp corner and becomes one of the hallways leading to the cell block. Anyone coming in or out would be able to see them, no question, but the lack of light allows the illusion of being hidden, which feels every bit as dangerous as he was afraid of.

She's so close. But not touching. All at once he's freshly and keenly aware of his own dirtiness, not only his hands but all of him - the patches of sweat under his arms, shirt sticking to his back, the smears that must still decorate his face. Dust permeating the fibers of his jeans. He's been working with the pigs; unsurprising if he literally smells like shit, and she's so clean, so lovely, and he wants to get his dirty fucking hands all over her, make _her_ dirty. Soil her. Mess her up, just like he did before. Muss her hair and tear her clothes, and streak her lovely face with tears.

His throat is a painful knot, and she's crossing her arms under those sweet little tits, her head cocked and that smile more than potential. The slightest quirk of her lips, but unmistakable. She's _amused_ by him.

He stares at her, and feels like a wretched idiot.

Finally she takes a breath. “Are you alright?”

His staring turns to gaping. He can't make sense of the question. It is quite literally nonsensical. Last night he fucked her until she was sobbing, must have bruised her up good, directed Daryl to gag her with his own dick and shoot come all over her pretty face. He didn't merely take her virginity; he practically _ripped_ it out of her. And she's standing here, calm as you please, and asking _him_ if he's _all right._

God help him, he's honestly not sure.

“‘cause you kinda seem like you might not be. Daryl wasn't.” That adorable smile widens. “Think I made him feel a lot better about it, but.” She rolls a shoulder and he gets it, and his mind collapses sideways like a brained cow. How exactly she _made Daryl feel a lot better._ What she might have done with him. To him. _For_ him.

And for the first time, it occurs to him that he might have the dynamic of this whole thing totally ass-backwards.

He manages to gather enough spit to swallow. Nods. But he knows perfectly goddamn well that he's not being convincing, and she's perceptive as hell. Sure enough, her eyes are narrowing skeptically, her head tilted further.

“Daryl thought maybe I didn't want it,” she says slowly. Deliberately. Driving each syllable home like a fist set into her palm - not aggressive, but firm. Leaving no room for any confusion regarding her meaning. “Do you?”

He tries to swallow again. Fails this time.

She doesn't wait longer for him to come up with an answer, and he might be grateful at being spared. The sigh she releases is exasperated, and bizarrely, he feels almost sheepish. “You think I would’ve been down there if I didn't? What’m I gonna have to do to make you get it?” She takes the smallest step closer, and he nearly backs up. She's pretty, and she's cute, and she's apparently capable of being terrifying. “Do you want me to suck your cock right here?”

He chokes. Blinks at her. He could swear he feels his pupils dilating, fresh sweat welling in his pores and his dick knocked into a single violent twitch.

Yes. Holy shit, _yes_. Shove her to her knees and seize the back of her head, wrap her hair around his fingers, thrust past her lips and fuck her mouth and _spray his come down her slutty throat,_ that would be amazing, that would be fucking _perfect_.

Only no.

He drags in a breath. It shakes a little - and it's odd, his lack of embarrassment, and how his hand _isn't_ shaking as he lifts a hand and glides his fingertips down her cheek to her chin, tips her face up to his.

He fucked the shit out of her. But before he separated himself from her, stood at an awkward distance while she got herself together and slipped away, look tossed over her shoulder on the way out that he couldn't read, he was gentle with her. Stroked her hair, murmured to her. Called her _sweet girl._

And so she is.

“Beth,” he whispers, leans in and nods their mouths together.

Instantly she parts her lips for him and moans, breathless, and he doesn't give a fuck about his dirty hands and his dirty body and his dirty mind. Because she sure as hell doesn’t seem to, though she's seen firsthand what he can do. She's pushing up on her toes, her hands laid against his chest and warm through his shirt, shifting eagerly when he guides her with his thumb under her jaw. Her tongue curls, dances over his - and he's never kissed her this way, this slow, this _careful_. His other hand settles into the dip at the small of her back and tugs her forward, but if there's roughness here, it's confined to the potential. The same territory her smile occupied.

More akin to a promise.

She sighs, loosens, rocks her pelvis and he knows she can feel his erection pressing into her hip, but the realization shivers down his spine: he doesn't want more than that. He does, but he doesn't. It's so wonderful to take her, fuck her, mess her up, do all those delightfully filthy things to her - and all the delightfully filthy things he _hasn't_ done - but maybe it's also good to not do them. Sometimes. Now.

Makes no damn sense, but neither does any of the rest of this.

Her hands rise, fingers comb into his damp hair, her nails scratching over his scalp, and he shivers again and almost laughs. And she _does_ laugh, her hot little body rolling against his, with his, gasping along with him when he breaks his mouth free of hers.

A thought, blowing his fucking mind: she doesn't mind how dirty he is because _dirty_ is precisely what she wants.

“I don't wanna stop,” she breathes, flicks her tongue against his lips and he bites back a whimper. “I wanna keep goin’. I want more.”

He groans and hauls her in again.

By the time she steps back, he's quivering all over, breathing like a sprinter, his cock throbbing like a bruise against his zipper. He gazes at her and she wipes her fingertips across her puffy lips, the shining skin around them. Her eyes are sparkling, two clear gems set into the dimness.

“I want more,” she repeats, and pauses, appears to be working through something. Arriving at it. Deciding. To say it, maybe, more than the thing itself. “I want more with you and him.”

Before he can even begin to formulate a response to that, she's gone. Flitting away like a dream, leaving nothing behind.

Except his unbearable hard-on, the ghost of her fingers prickling across his skin - how wickedly clever he knows those fingers are - her sweet smell, and the taste of her.

Taste he falls back against the wall and savors as he licks it off his lips. Savors, and finds himself drifting into the idea, surely the fantasy, that it’s not just her lingering on his tongue. Where else her pretty, slutty mouth might recently have been.

Where else it might go.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A couple of days, and things have eased up a bit. Rick is content to wait and see where they go. But Beth's first real run, that pesky rainstorm again, an abandoned house and a couch and a possibly ill-advised game... And really, he shouldn't be surprised when it goes where it does. 
> 
> Except he is. With one part of it? Very surprised.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should have spent all afternoon working on my doctoral dissertation, which means reading and writing about Nazi extermination camps. Instead I spent all afternoon on this. I should regret it. I don't.
> 
> And no, this is not the last chapter. I don't think it's even close.
> 
> Special credit/thanks/blame has to go to Mollie, because of the usual reasons and because she basically gave me the stuck-in-a-house-on-a-run scenario when I myself was stuck on what came next. ❤️

But nothing much happens for three days after that.

Something. Little things. The day after the brief makeout session in the hall by the door, she doesn't give him a whole lot more than a few glances, a hello, flashes of a smile in a way that was commonplace enough before they started this whole crazy fucking thing. But the smile isn't _entirely_ conventional; there's a wicked edge in it, nearly imperceptible, so subtle at first he wonders if he's merely seeing what he wants to see. But by the end of that day he's sure, and sure that the extra wiggle in her hips as she walks by is no accident, the extra clinginess of the tee she wears, the outlines of her bra just visible through the thin green fabric and unobscured by her light cardigan.

She's being a dirty little cocktease, and he aches and wants to palm himself through his jeans and has to battle back the almost overwhelming urge to drag her into a dark corner and slam her up against the wall and get her hand on that cock she's teasing, get her to make good on it.

But he doesn't. He simply watches her as surreptitiously as he can, and that night after the whole block is asleep he thinks about doing exactly what he wanted to her and jacks off in his cell, hot come spilling all over his fingers as he bites back his groans, and he very pointedly doesn't think about the fact that Judith is sleeping barely feet away and he's a sick piece of shit.

Even if Beth wants it, wants it bad and isn't going to let there be any confusion about that fact, she's still basically half his age and the idea of corrupting her sweet teenage innocence is all _kinds_ of delicious, and he's a sick piece of shit.

She's really not resembling anything as innocent as he thought. But even so. He loves the idea of it. The fantasy. And it's a fantasy she appears eager to give him.

So the second day. More of the same, and by then he's sure he wants to let her make the first move. The throbbing ache between his legs is awful, but there's also something great about it, something that feels so torturously good, like teetering on the precipice of a bigger climax. He watches her wiggle, watches her luscious ass sway and her shirt lying softly against her cute little bee stings, returns her smiles with tiny versions of his own, and he thinks about shoving her to her knees and slapping her face with his dick and fucking her cockteasing mouth until she's choking.

One of the worst things about it, one of the things that proves to him that he's _really_ sick, is that facing Hershel isn't all that much of a problem anymore. Feels a bit weird, sure, a bit uncomfortable, but the mask is easy to put on. The face of an upstanding-citizen-family-man Rick Grimes who doesn't want to ruin this decent man’s youngest daughter. Who hasn't already done a fair amount of that.

But Daryl is another story.

~

Daryl is hardly looking at him at all. Not totally avoiding him, but keeping interactions to a minimum, even more taciturn than he usually is - which is fucking _saying_ something - and putting in the absolute minimum the interaction in question requires before he stalks off to do whatever. Not scared, no. Not angry. He's not sure _what_ Daryl is feeling, which is in some ways even more troubling to him than fear or anger, because taciturn or no, over the course of the past year and a half Daryl has become relatively easy for him to read.

Daryl doesn't actually hide much, if you know him well. If you know what you're looking for. Looking at.

He's not sure what he's seeing now.

Could push. Doesn't. Lets it go and is merely troubled, because he's not clear on what he was hoping for after what happened between them all, but he knows it wasn't this.

So it's possible he's really fucked something up, something important, and has no clue how to go about fixing it, and that _does_ bother him. Worries him. And the second night he lies in his cell with his diamond-hard dick in his hand, stroking himself and trying so fiercely to be quiet, and the cock he sees in her mouth isn't his. Not a fantasy but a memory: balls deep in her, arm wrenched behind her back, her head twisted up at a painful angle and Daryl’s thick hands gripping her as he fucks her mouth, her face a mess of tears and spit.

His thick hands and his thick cock. Uncut, foreskin stretched around the dark head, the vein snaking up the side. The sheen of wet on his shaft. It looked so smooth, so slick, and he's thinking about how, if he got his hand around it, it would feel different from his own, sliding his fingers up and down where her mouth was, seeing if he could coax the same noises out of him, Daryl’s lips parted and his eyes squeezed shut and moaning so loud-

He comes like a punch, biting the edges of his tongue and spurting across his belly, twice and a softer pulse, and then he lies there with his dick going soft in his fist and semen cooling on his skin, staring at the ceiling.

This is very, very troubling. He likes it, overall, but holy Christ it really is.

He wipes off his belly with a balled-up shirt and rolls onto his side, eyes still open into the vagueness of the dark, Beth all at once - _for_ once - faded into the background as his mind races in a hectic circle.

 _Don't freak out._ Jesus.

Just don't.

He's not a queer. He's not gay. He would have to know that by now. He would have felt something, thought something - isn't that how it works? Don't you _know?_ Because that's simply how someone _is,_ they figure it out early, and it's not like he thinks someone should be anyone other than who they are, not like he's got some kind of _problem_ with it, but that’s not him because _he would know._

But there's this, sudden and vivid, and he inhales.

Once when he was almost fifteen and Shane cajoled him into his first beer, sixpack in the woods on a Friday night in early summer - stolen from Shane’s old man but he'd never miss it. Setting off a few firecrackers, stupid teenager bullshit, Shane talking a big game about girls he claimed to already be fucking and completely wasn't fucking, Rick with an awkward combination of admiration and jealousy and inward eyerolling. Two beers in for each of them, working on their third, the world gently spinning, Shane going off to a tree and pulling out his dick to take a piss and Rick thinking blearily that it might be a good idea to join him and then…

He's not clear on how it happened. They never said a damn word to each other about it after. He's not even sure Shane remembers. But he does.

A hoarse, cocky, shaky suggestion. Nod. What the hell. Rough, bigger hand replacing his own and moving, stroking him. His own hand curled, Shane’s cock heavy and hard against his palm. Weird. But it felt good. His hips tilting forward and the sound of a moan, and the low hoot of an owl somewhere above them.

That's all he recalls.

Yeah, so far as he remembers it felt good, felt fine, but he didn't _want_ it and he never wanted anything like it later, barely thought about it, so he's not. He's not that. That's not him.

He would know.

And on day three he establishes it for certain.

~

Beth has argued for it before. Not whiny, not irritating, but periodically she makes the firm case that she's closing in on twenty, she's not a baby, she can handle a gun and held her own for months on the road, and she should be allowed to make a damn run. It's not like she's demanding to go alone. She's not an idiot. She doesn't _want_ to go alone. She just wants to be with the next group.

If she doesn't start learning now, how is she ever going to learn at all?

The deciding no vote has always been Hershel - calm and managing to not be condescending, but decisive - and Rick has always gone along with him, because the man is her father and therefore should always have the final say.

Because for a while there he wasn't quite so appalling as he is now.

But now they need more baby formula, and some laundry detergent if any can be located, and this time, Hershel sitting at the table and looking placidly up at her as she leans forward and offers the argument all over again, Rick stops on his way past and listens.

And before he knows what he's about, he's opening his big stupid mouth and backing her up.

“She's right.” Every bit as calm as the two of them, almost casual, and inside he's screaming _oh god what are you DOING_ at himself, because he can see what's coming next a fucking country mile away. “She's good with a gun, you've seen her. I'd trust her to handle herself.” And as she's looking up at him, her doe eyes wide with pleased surprise, and in the corner of his vision he catches sight of the familiar figure standing a little way behind him, he finishes fucking himself over.

Not just himself.

_You son of a bitch._

“Daryl and me can go with her. She’ll be fine.”

And of course, _of course,_ because this could never have gone any other way, because he identifies the worst thing he can possibly do and he does it, because that's Rick Grimes for you, reliably fucking up everything he touches, Hershel sighs and sits back and says that well, if they're going with her, okay.

Okay.

~

It's mostly manageable until the rain starts. Quiet, a bit awkward, but nothing he can't deal with. Until he actually can't anymore.

It's not his fault. He’ll maintain that until the day he dies.

They're most of the way into town when the sky opens up with a roar and dumps the entire contents of the clouds down onto their heads. A block in the road a ways back forced them to leave the car and continue on foot - not a problem, there are a few stores close by that they know for a fact haven't been completely cleaned out - but all at once they're absolutely soaked, the rain so heavy it's difficult to see through. Rick is turning, looking for the two of them and for any easily accessible shelter, when Daryl grabs his arm and tugs, and he follows in the direction indicated. They're not yet as far as their first stop, but anywhere with cover is more than acceptable.

And that's how the three of them end up in some long-vanished suburbanite’s living room, a faded floral couch dominating with a La-z-Boy and a splintered pressboard coffee table shoved to the side and the dead eye of a broken TV glaring balefully at them, dripping water somewhere further into the house and hail rattling on the roof and against the windowpanes on the other side of the boards nailed across the windows.

Dead walker upstairs. Tacky lemon yellow wallpaper downstairs. Actual lemons all over it. The kitchen cabinets are, unfortunately, empty except for bowls and plates and silverware, cleaning supplies. Rick sits on the worn brown carpet, toying with his Colt and listening to the storm. Daryl is leaning against the frame of the entranceway between the the living room and equally trashed dining room, bow still over his shoulder. A few feet away, Beth scans her surroundings, sighs, moves to the couch and sinks down onto it with her hands clasped between her knees.

“Guess we’re stuck here.”

Daryl grunts. “‘less you wanna get wetter.”

“I don't think I could get a whole lot wetter,” she says, a bit primly, and wrings her ponytail out onto the floor, whipping it back over her shoulder. “Anyway, there's the hail.”

“So we stay. Place seems secure enough.” Rick looks around the room - not much point, nothing has changed in the last minute, but he needs to do _something_. He's uneasy. Jittery.

It has nothing to do with their safety.

She flops backward, huffs. “Gotta do somethin’ in the meantime. I looked for boardgames. Didn't find any, though.”

Daryl coughs a laugh. “Boardgames, girl?”

“Yeah. Y’know. We always played boardgames when it was rainin’ like this.” Her voice drops slightly, and something in Rick’s chest turns over and twinges. “When it was doin’ anythin’ like this outside. All five of us.”

“Yeah, well, I ain't playin’ no goddamn Candyland.” But Daryl’s voice is gentle. Gentler than Rick thinks he's heard in a while. And teasing, just a little - and it's easy to discern what he's doing, trying to get her mind off it.

Maybe trying to make her laugh.

She does, a breath of it. “We didn't play that. We played Monopoly. Trivial Pursuit - Maggie won that all the time. Mousetrap, but the traps never worked right.” She's quiet a moment, glancing back at Daryl and then at Rick, her fingers picking at each other in her lap - and when Rick sees her thighs squeeze together and a gleam flash into her eyes, he thinks _here we go._

He couldn't stop her if he wanted to. She's a force of fucking nature.

“You both know how to play Truth or Dare?”

 _Naturally_. Naturally it's this. He tilts his head at her as his stomach does six or seven rapid somersaults, and he's reasonably certain she can't tell. “Yeah, of course.”

She looks back again, turning her whole body, one hand on the top of the couch and her spine twisted into a graceful arch. “Daryl?”

Daryl blinks at her. Then shifts his gaze, looks past her, eyes hitting Rick’s like twin bolts, and it's as though Daryl is asking the question aloud, clear as if he's shouting across the room. Not like in the basement. Much more solid. More articulated. More confident, even if it's not wholly that. Even if, behind Daryl’s eyes, he still sees nerves as jittery as his own feel.

_We doing this?_

Rick sucks in a breath. Smallest bob of his chin. Smallest possible nod.

_Bet your ass we are._

Daryl grunts again, steps forward. Shrugs off the bow and bends to lean it against the side of the couch. “Yeah.”

“Great. I'll go first.” She grins - Christ, her crooked front teeth and the curl of her lips, _adorable,_ and draws her legs up, crosses them. She's still so wet, they all are, but she no longer seems to care, and Rick is finding that he doesn't either. Except to the degree that it makes her clingy shirt even more clingy, and very faintly through it and her bra he can see the tiny pebbles of her nipples.

Get those between his fingers, give them a good hard pinch. Make her squeal.

Daryl sits down against the wall, forearms resting on his bent knees, and watches her with hooded eyes. And it's difficult to keep from wondering if he's getting hard already, what exactly he wants to happen first, how he wants to do this.

How he wants to make use of her.

She cocks her head and thoughtfully fingers the beaded thong of one of her bracelets, then turns her attention on Rick, which is nothing more or less than he expected. It's like there's another set of rules here beneath the explicit ones, and no one had to explain it to any of them. “Rick, truth or dare?”

He doesn't dare. _Not yet._ He clears his throat, sets the gun aside. “Truth.”

“Have you ever broken the law, Officer Grimes?”

He laughs. Not hard, but he can't help it; there's something adorable about the question, as adorable as her crooked front teeth, and yes, here it is: that fantasy she's very consciously giving him, because the question is so innocent and her face is so innocent, big doe eyes, and behind them is a wild glitter that's anything but.

“Yeah.” Pause. He's going there in his head, in spite of what's happening in his pants. In truth, these are good memories, and because of that they hurt a little. “Shoplifted a couple times. Just stupid shit, just to do it. And I drank a few beers underage. More than a few.”

The corner of her mouth quirks. But now that evil glitter has subsided somewhat. She hasn't made a mistake, she doesn't think that, but this is a place none of them really meant to touch. “Shane made you do that stuff, I'm guessin’.”

He nods. Half smile. Maybe this hurts, but it does hurt less than it did. “It was always him.”

Daryl is silent. Watching.

“Your turn,” she says softly, and, inexorable as the end of the goddamn world, his eyes slide to Daryl.

“Truth or dare?”

Daryl looks back at him for what feels like an hour and can't be more than a few seconds. The hail pounds above them, sounding big as fists. “Truth.”

If someone put a gun to his head and forced him into honesty here, he would admit that he had no plan for this. No dare in mind, no question ready to ask. So he doesn't bother with a mental scramble, simply delivers the first awful thing that his brain tosses up.

“You ever have sex someplace public?”

His eyes narrow. _The basement doesn't count._

And then he can't tell if Daryl is reading his mind or not, because Daryl responds, calmly, “What counts as public?”

It feels like Beth’s eyes are heating the entire room, her gaze burning little fingers on his skin as he says, “Doesn't have to be right out in front of anyone. But someplace a lot of people are.” His nails are biting into his palms. “Like a bathroom in a mall or something. Car in a full parking lot. Park in broad daylight.”

Another pause that feels like it goes on for days. He's grateful that he's already wet, because they won't be able to tell that he's sweating bullets. But whether they can see the bulge of his cock packed against his fly and straining to get free is another story.

Finally, flatly, “No.” His gaze swings immediately to Beth. “Truth or dare?”

She swallows. It’s all going according to those unspoken rules, and this is the next stage. “Dare.”

Daryl kicks Rick straight in the fucking head.

“Take your shirt off.” Airless beat. “Bra too.”

No _I dare you to_. No qualifier. Nothing to give her any room to dodge. He's _commanding_ her. And this thing might yet appear to go on for another round or two, Rick thinks, might hold up the facade of being just this silly game they're playing, but in fact this is the end of it, where all the dares begin and end and they're just doing…

Doing whatever they want.

She's shivering as she slowly reaches down, takes her shirt by the hem and starts to tug it up over the flat plane of her stomach, the delicate arch of her ribcage as she raises her arms. Shivering, and Rick can't tell if it's from the cold or something much hotter, and it doesn't matter. He watches her, mouth as dry as her clothes are wet, as her tits come into view, those delightful little handfuls, and then she's tossing the shirt aside and reaching back to unhook her bra. Eyes downcast. Playing at bashfulness. But maybe not completely playing, because she's blushing a brilliant scarlet from her chest all the way up to the shells of her ears.

Shrugging her bra straps down her arms. It joins her shirt on the floor and she sits there half naked, close enough for him to see the gooseflesh running all over her, those nipples so tight and suckable. And he's going to suck them. Oh, yes, he very much fucking is.

He glances at Daryl, who's motionless - except for his chest. His breath coming rapid and shallow. Might be his imagination, but he'd swear he can see the pulse fluttering in his throat.

It's like her attention seizes him by the jaw, yanks his head back and forces him to look at her - and the corners of her mouth are quivering, because she's going to get revenge now, and it's not going to be directed at Daryl, and that's fine, because later he’ll insist to himself that it wasn't his fault but for right now he's happy to shoulder half the responsibility.

“Show me your dick.”

His fingers are at his belt before she's done with the last word. If nothing else he's _frantic_ to give it some space, ease the awful cramped feeling, and when he gets his fly down, reaches into his shorts and tugs it free, it's like he can breathe again. And he does gasp, staring down at himself, the way his cock twitches in his fist when he squeezes it, the bead of precome gathering at his slit and overflowing and rolling down to his fingers.

She gasps too. Like she's never seen it before, like this is some kind of revelation, and he looks up at her - and no one has ever looked at him like this. He's sitting here on the floor with his dick in his hand, and it's possible that an outside observer might consider him pretty goddamn ridiculous, but she sure as hell doesn't seem to think so, and that makes him feel…

He has no idea how that makes him feel.

He looks at Daryl and - for some reason, what is the _point_ \- fights back a moan. Because if Beth is looking at him like he's some kind of fucking revelation, Daryl is looking at him in a way that's utterly indescribable, and what he's realizing, like a revelation of his own, is that Daryl looking at him in this way is like a set of soft wet lips on his cock and shit, he could come from that alone.

So what the hell. He lifts his hips, gives himself a slow stroke from base to head, meets Daryl’s rapt dark eyes and doesn't leave them.

If he’s not a queer, he has no idea what he is.

No _truth or dare._ No options. Everything they're doing right now is the truth. He licks his lips, not that he has a lot of moisture to do it with. “You. Now you.”

Daryl still isn't looking away from him as his hands drift mindlessly to his belt and his fly, undoing both, but he's moving like he's in a dream, nowhere near fast enough, _focus,_ and Rick grits his teeth and strokes himself again and lets the awful thing in him out, lets it take the rest of him over, lets the words ride out on a growl.

“C’mon, Daryl. Take it outta your pants. Show me your fucking dick.”

Daryl’s groan is in unison with Beth’s, such different voices oddly tuneful as they mingle, and he does it, draws out his thick, throbbing, _beautiful_ cock, and Rick stares at it and thinks about his dry mouth, thinks about getting it wet like this, thinks about taking the precome running down Daryl’s shaft and smearing it across his own lips.

Which is when he's sure he's fucked.

No buildup. Daryl doesn't need any more coaxing - and that makes sense, he didn't in the basement either, just dove right on in when it came down to it, because he’s already jerking himself into a slow, easy rhythm as he turns to Beth. “Play with your pussy.”

But she already is.

Jeans still on, yeah. But she's unfolded her legs and spread them wide and she's got a hand between them, pressing down and rubbing as her other hand kneads her tit, her lips parted and her breath coming in short heaves. Working herself up to a simmer, _naughty girl,_ like this wasn't her plan all along. Fucking hell, maybe she _made_ it rain. Maybe she's that powerful. A lithe little goddess with loose strands of damp blond hair hanging around her face, reaching down to pull off her boots and lifting her ass off the couch, thumbing her jeans and panties together down her thighs. Kicking them away and half reclining there in all her glory, coyly biting her thumbnail and batting her long lashes at them as she opens the dark, fat lips of her pussy with two fingers, displaying all that slick pink wet.

And Rick isn't sure when or how he got as close to her as he is, but he leans in and smells her, the dense scent of her arousal, and sees the semi-translucent trickle of her juices running down into the crack of her ass. He knows how she tastes, how delicious she is - another way to fix his dry-mouth problem - and he's leaning closer, poised to give her a broad lick from her entrance all the way to her swollen clit-

She presses her palm against his head, cuts that off _very_ effectively. Releases a shivery moan.

“Kiss each other.”

All the air rushes out of the room.

He's dimly aware of what he's doing, what _they're_ doing. Settling back on his knees with his cock still jutting out of his fly, gaping at her, and she's pushing herself up to look at him, anxiety flashing across her face. Instantly he gets it: that she's scared she's gone too far, stepped over some line she got too worked up to think about, and now this is wrecked and none of them will get to have any fun at all, the whole game collapsed with three words.

Like hell.

He turns and Daryl is there next to him, gaping too, jaw numbly dropped and his hand motionless on his cock. And the thing is that this goes three ways, so it might really yet be a problem - and _God,_ he doesn't want that, but what's been true since the beginning, his own fucked up urges aside, is that this entire foundation is built on all three of them being all in.

Can't work any other way.

“You don't have to,” he whispers. Just like the basement, how gentle Beth was with him. Inviting him, maybe even tempting him. But he could walk away. He could have. Could have, and Rick so desperately didn't want him to. “I swear, you don't. You don't have to do anything you don't wanna do. Daryl, you-”

Thick, calloused fingers against his lips. Instinctively he flicks out his tongue and tastes salt, and then something almost sweet, and he knows what it is and almost fucking collapses. Clear blue eyes searing into his, and a single nod.

He grips the nape of Daryl’s neck with his free hand and slams their mouths together.

It's like nothing else he's ever done. It's a kiss, he's had so many of those, but it's not just a kiss; the prickle of scruff against his cheek, his jaw, such a different texture to his skin, everything bigger somehow, and a deeper groan as he pushes Daryl’s lips apart with his tongue and licks him open, licks _into_ him, strokes their tongues together and feels the click as their teeth collide. For a frozen instant Daryl merely yields - and then shoves right back, teeth scraping at him as his mouth arches, slides, and it's messy and clumsy and he doesn't give a shit. And she wanted this, _she made them,_ but even though he hears her whimper ringing off the walls, hears it even above the drum of the hail, and the squelch as she pushes her fingers into her pussy, for the moment she's secondary. There's only Daryl’s hot, rough mouth, and then his hot, rough body pressing in, something moving against Rick’s cock, and the image of what he might see if he broke this enough to look down just about destroys him.

So he does, wrenches away and looks, sees their cocks lined up and rubbing as they rock their hips together.

The sound he makes is high and broken, and it's fucking stunning that he doesn't come right then.

He rakes his fingers into Daryl’s hair and hauls him in and kisses him again.

He doesn't know how long it goes on. It might be a while. Grinding slowly together, uneven pulses of pleasure surging through him as he thrusts his tongue into Daryl’s mouth, fucks it into him, is fucked. Those calloused fingers on his cheeks, his neck, moving like Daryl doesn't know quite what to do with them, settling finally at his hips to urge him faster. Beth’s high breathy _ahh-ahh-ahh_ as she does what Daryl said and plays, and out of the corner of her eye he sees her tweaking her nipple, twisting and pulling at it - and that's what finally knocks him out of it, because he decided he was going to suck on those sweet nipples and by almighty God he _is_.

He practically wrestles away from Daryl and throws his body sideways to kneel between her legs, clasps her waist and drags her forward and closes his lips around one hard little bud.

She yelps, gropes one-handed at his head, and her other hand doesn't miss a damn beat, fingers pumping in and out of her pussy. Close above him he hears a delighted _mmm_ and a wet sound like her fucking herself, and doesn't have to look up to know that Daryl is kissing her, devouring her mouth while Rick devours her tit and switches to the other, and just like he wanted to, he sucks hard enough to make her squeal - though it's muffled.

They're going to fucking eat her alive.

It's perfect.

Perfect when together they strip off the rest of their clothes and maneuver her up sideways on the couch, on her knees with her elbows resting on the arm, and her gorgeous ass is in the air and wiggling like she can do best, like a fucking pro, as Daryl pushes himself up, knee on the couch and foot on the floor, lines himself up and rams into her. She squeals again, closer to a scream, and Rick frames her face with his hands - Jesus, her beautiful face, tears already shining in her eyes and her lips plump and glistening and so ready for him, and he gazes down at her as Daryl starts fucking her fast and fierce and absolutely merciless.

“Yeah,” he breathes, flicks his eyes up to Daryl’s, wants to sob. Later he’ll wish he had taken more time to really _look,_ see this man’s body as it was revealed to him, take it all in and appreciate it like he's sure it should be appreciated, but for this moment his world consists of Daryl’s burning eyes, and he feels like his head is exploding. “Fuck, _yeah,_ you take it, bitch. You take him. Take his big cock in your slutty pussy, take it all.”

She whines, and he clenches his fingers against her jaw, jerks her head up into an arch that has to hurt. “You gonna take me too? Yeah, you are. You're gonna take my cock down your whore throat. You ready? You better be, here it fucking comes.”

Her mouth is exactly the soft, soaked heaven he imagined it would be.

For a moment or two he can't even keep his eyes open, holding the sides of her head as his own falls back between his shoulders, and the gagging sounds she makes as he fucks her face are like music, like her singing, but he has to look. Has to see this. Forces his head up and watches as Daryl pounds her into the couch, the smack of his skin on Beth’s and his harsh panting and his grunts of exertion, his hand snapping up to grab her ponytail and pull her head back even further. Somewhere in there they find a rhythm together and share it like they're sharing her, pushing each other higher and higher, and all at once it's crashing into him and he drags her head down so far that her lips brush his pubic hair and her choked cry is nearly panicked. It's perfect, it's _perfect;_ he bares his teeth and snarls _shit yes you suck my come down your fucking throat you dirty little cunt_ and shoots it into her as ecstasy roars through his head.

He thinks he might actually and finally and for-real tumble to the floor. But his cock pops out of her mouth, dripping thick spit and come as she coughs and keens, and he can hold it together enough to bend and reach under her and work her clit until she's screaming again and twisting into a convulsion, to take Daryl’s cock in his hand when he pulls out of her, jerk him off over her trembling back as he laughs into his mouth.

Jesus fucking Christ, he's horrible. He's a complete and total monster.

It's as glorious as she is.

~

Then after: her snuggled between them, her head against Daryl’s chest and her legs slung across Rick’s lap, their heavy exhausted breathing and her quiet sniffles. Like she's been crying, because she has, but she's smiling now, as shaky as the rest of her, and dreamily happy.

Blissful.

He watches her for a while as the blood slows in his veins. Looks at Daryl. He can do this without undue awkwardness, because Daryl is sprawled and leaning back, eyes closed as he works his fingers through the tangle of her hair. Outside, the storm is dying off and moving on, the rain not much more than a hum, hints of sun peeking through the cracks between the boards.

He said she could handle herself, and good lord, did she ever. Handled herself and got handled nice and hard, and now she's curled up with them, _sweet baby girl,_ as pretty all fucked out like this as she ever is. Glowing.

She's not the only one.

His arm is slung over the back of the couch. So is Daryl’s. He shifts and their fingers brush, and Daryl’s hand twitches - and doesn't pull away, not even when Rick twines his lightly through them, their fingertips pressed together.

He's not a queer, at least not like he's always thought of it, and that's confusing as hell and he'd be lying if he said it wasn't more than a little alarming - but maybe it's also okay. Or it might be.

He’ll just have to see.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the way back from the run with Beth and Rick, Daryl wrestles with his feelings - for Beth, but even more for Rick, with what they are and what they might mean. But when he grabs sunset guard duty in the tower, Rick isn't going to let him wrestle alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is yet another situation where I was like doo doo doo I'll just write some more porn and instead ended up with The Epic Love Story of Rick and Daryl. It's a problem. 
> 
> In all seriousness, yet another thing that's surprising me about this fic - aside from the fact that it's still _going_ \- is how yeah, the sexual monster in Rick is coming out to play a good bit, but that's not the only side of him that's emerging as I write. So this was an interesting change of tone in a lot of ways.
> 
> (also there's a tiny bit in here that I accidentally stole from Mollie's [At the Beginning With You,](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4724267) like I got there and was like hey this is familiar I wonder wh- OHHHHH)
> 
> Finally, be aware: the first part of this deals with Daryl's memories of some really vicious homophobia, including extreme physical violence against a gay kid. Nothing graphic or gratuitous, but it might be upsetting to some, so proceed with caution. 
> 
> ❤️

Daryl is quiet the whole way back.

He wonders what they think. He wonders what they're thinking of _him,_ and his silence. Trying to analyze, as much as he can without being obvious, the way Beth and Rick are looking at him. The way they're looking at each other. Sitting up front with Rick on the drive, chewing on his thumbnail and gazing out the window at the green blur of the pines. He can feel Beth’s eyes boring into his head. Might be his imagination but he doesn't think so.

He wonders if they think he's freaking out. He's honestly not sure whether or not he is.

There's something here that he's genuinely not certain he can handle, and instead of pulling out he merely keeps pushing deeper - and isn't that appropriate imagery, given that less than an ago he had Beth bent over the arm of the ratty sofa and he was fucking her every bit as hard as he ever saw Rick do, slamming himself into her over and over while Rick choked her with his dick - and God, he fucking liked it. Liked it just as much as he did when their positions were reversed. It was as though something broke open in his head and his body guided itself, what it wanted and how bad that wanting was, and the way he treated her was horrifying. How Rick treated her, and he not only watched and didn't try to stop it but actually _helped Rick do it._

Twice now.

And she appeared to _love_ it, cuddling with him after, that weakly happy smile on her face, and he truly doesn't believe she faked any of that happiness. When you come right down to it, she orchestrated pretty much the entire thing, got them precisely where she wanted them and made them-

Well, if he is in fact freaking out about anything, it's not what he said and did to her and how much he liked it.

He squeezes his eyes shut and bites down hard on his nail.

Merle gave him shit, related to things of this kind. Merle wasn't the only one. Never with any real intent to wound deep; the cruelty of Merle’s insults was usually casual. If anything, he understands - even appreciates - that Merle was giving him shit because Merle was worried about him, worried that he wasn't okay and wanted him to be, and not just because of the potential embarrassment of a brother who demonstrated essentially no interest in sex at any time, and when he did, he knew Merle could tell that by and large it was feigned.

He was a man, right? He wasn't no pansy-ass faggot, flouncing around all limp-wristed and swishy, fluttering his eyelashes at anyone with a sizable dick. He didn't want to get down on his knees, didn't want to take it up the ass. Yeah? Didn't he? _Go on and prove it, then. Jesus fucking Christ, little brother, you don't sack up and get in there and fuck that bitch, people are gonna get the wrong idea about you._

 _Shit, maybe you_ are _some kinda faggot. Don't make me beat that outta you. ‘cause you know I will._

And the truth was, he wasn't. He didn't want those things. He didn't want much of anything either way, and the particular brand of genitalia didn't seem to matter. For a while, not long after he figured out what it meant for him when his dick got hard and how it felt when he touched it - which really was pretty damn good, even if it wasn't something he generally felt much of an urge to do - he did worry about that. Looked around at the girls in his school back when he still bothered with school at all and did lengthy self-inventory, then looked at the boys, surreptitiously gave their bodies a once over in the crumbling moldy-walled locker room after gym class and searched himself for any kind of response, but he never discovered anything, at least nothing he considered worthy of note.

He worried about it because he lived where he lived and his father was who he was, and if it turned out that he really was a faggot, Merle _beating it out of him_ would be the least of his problems. Merle wasn't even there most of the time by then.

Hushed stories about a kid in a neighborhood a few miles away, everyone knew what he was, and one day a bunch of older boys dragged him off his bike and into the woods and strung him up to a tree by his wrists - _his limp wrists_ \- and they all took turns with a baseball bat.

The kid died in the hospital a day later. Even if he had lived, he would have been a fucking vegetable.

If Daryl was a faggot, someone would kill him. Only question was who. And it wouldn't have surprised him at all if his ultimate murderer in that case turned out to be Will Dixon.

He was half expecting that to happen anyway.

But no. He didn't get to be even that wretched kind of normal. He thought he could understand wanting dick; why was it really that different from wanting pussy? He couldn't see how. He couldn't see, when you got right down to it, what the big deal was. It was all just _people,_ just people wanting the things they wanted, wanting to fuck the people they wanted to fuck, and he couldn't fathom why he should care, why it should reasonably ever be any of his damn business.

He did what he always does. Kept his mouth shut. Kept his head down. Fought when he had to, postured and blustered to avoid it when he could. After a while he stopped worrying about it, just like he stopped worrying about the whole thing in general, except when he got exasperated and tired, and fucked some equally tired-eyed woman in a motel room or the back of a pickup or whatever shithole they happened to be crashing in, so Merle would leave him alone.

Simple. Didn't even have to pay much attention to it. Get hard, let his body do its thing, a few minutes and then shooting his load into the condom, pulling out, throwing the thing away, proceeding with his life.

Then there was Beth Greene, and Rick Grimes, and he doesn't understand anything anymore.

Her soft wet mouth. Her soft wet pussy. Both so sweet, _she's_ so sweet, she makes him feel so good, and he was starting to get his mind around that, but now…

Bright flash of pain, and he strips the nail so far back that he exposes the quick. Hisses and hopes they don't notice.

Now there's _Rick’s_ mouth, nothing like hers, the roughness of his skin and his stubble, his long powerful hands, one of those hands curling around his dick and jerking him off over Beth’s gorgeous ass and he simply stared down at it as it happened, didn't make any attempt to stop it. Didn't _want_ to stop it. Didn't want to stop kissing him, once it started. Didn't want to stop grinding slowly against him, their cocks lined up so perfectly without even really having to try - it felt unlike anything he's ever felt before. Heat of another man’s body. Slick of another man’s precome. Couldn't work up the courage to touch Rick there but if he's totally honest it's not like he didn't want that too, Christ, he's thinking about it now, all at once thinking about reaching over and curving his palm against Rick’s crotch right this goddamn second, just to see what he would do.

Might crash the car. That's what Rick might do.

He wants to laugh. Bites his lip so he won't. It would be hysterical laughter and that would be tough to explain.

He thought he knew what he was. He thought he settled that a long time ago. Didn't know what the word for it would be - he's a fucking _freak,_ that's what he is, that word does the job just fine - but if nothing else he knew what he wasn't, and that was probably good enough.

Apparently not.

For the last few days, Beth has been overwhelmingly on his mind. But he’s thinking about Rick’s mouth all the way home.

~

They picked up what they went out there for. Back at the prison, they unload it and part ways, like everything is extremely normal and nothing is going on, like he and Rick didn't spend a chunk of the afternoon making out and then fucking a teenage girl. They're convincing; he's sure of it. No one gives them any suspicious looks as far as he can tell.

He says hi to Maggie on his way past and he doesn't crumple to his knees in sheer mortification.

Honestly? He's not all that mortified. Which is, in itself, mortifying.

He doesn't look back at Rick or at Beth as he heads into the prison. Goes to their communal kitchen, grabs some freshly cooked venison and a slice of the bread they've been able to make with the usable yeast he and Michonne found on a run. He finds Carol sitting on the steps up to the catwalk, sharpening her knife, and he sits down next to her and eats in silence, and that's good.

That _is_ normal. Even if he's hopelessly abnormal and always will be. It's not like he can do anything about it. It's not like he can undo what he's done.

It's not like he wants to.

~

He's taking a shift in the guard tower, sitting with his legs under the railing and dangling over the edge, smoking a battered cigarette and watching the sun go down, when Rick climbs up to him.

He looks up, squinting, cigarette held between his thumb and forefinger and halted on the way to his mouth. The sun is directly behind Rick and his face is lost in shadow, but he knows where Rick’s eyes would be and he successfully meets them and is a little proud of himself when he doesn't waver. This isn't a situation where he's unsafe, he senses on the deepest level. Never thought it would be. Rick isn't going to beat the queer out of him. Rick isn't going to try to hurt him at all, and not least because _Rick_ is the one who kissed him, who grabbed his dick and jerked him off and kissed him while he did that too.

But he's not certain what's going to happen here. And he's not certain what he's going to do.

For a long moment, Rick does nothing at all. Says nothing, either. Merely stands there, one hand on the railing, and looks down at him, and even if Daryl can't read his face, he can feel Rick thinking. Mulling.

He waits.

Finally Rick releases a heavy breath and lifts his chin at the space beside Daryl, and Daryl recognizes it for what it is: a request for permission. Which somehow he didn't expect - though Rick did that before. From the beginning, Rick hasn't _made_ him do anything, and he's felt none of the resentful pressure Merle always put on his shoulders.

He nods. Brings the cigarette to his lips and inhales. Rick sits down beside him, legs dangling alongside his own, leans his arms against the middle bar of the railing and gazes moodily out at the trees and the birds rustling through them as they swoop and dive in their evening rounds.

They're going to have it out, him and Rick. One way or the other, they are. They have to. His stomach coils and he fights back a shudder, one that isn't entirely unpleasant and which he doesn't entirely understand.

Where the impetus comes from, he doesn't know and never will, but against all reason and expectation he's the one who breaks the silence, inhaling again and blowing smoke into the cool air and staring down at the cigarette as he rolls it between his fingers.

“I ain’t-”

“Neither am I.”

It seems improbable that Rick could have known what he was going to say after two words. Nevertheless. 

He turns to look at Rick, blinks. Somehow - maybe he was wrong to assume - he didn't expect this. Rick should be the one on top of things here, in every meaningful way. Rick _knows_ shit. Sometimes Rick is uncertain, sometimes he takes time to deliberate, plenty of times he makes mistakes, but Rick knows shit, Rick knows himself, and he's never gotten anything but the sense that Rick knows what he _wants._

Sure as hell appears to know what he wants when it comes to Beth.

But the way Rick is looking at him… No, maybe he doesn't. Because Rick is picking at his own fingers in a decidedly un-Rick way, a way far more characteristic of Daryl, and going by his expression, he doesn't appear certain about anything.

Jesus Christ, he looks almost _nervous._

“I'm not,” Rick repeats. “Least I don't think so. I never…” He trails off, swings his gaze back out to the world, the oncoming twilight. In the distance, the moon is already rising over the treetops, pale gold and huge and nearly full. “I never did that,” he finishes quietly. “With a man. I never did that in my life. I never even wanted to.”

Daryl stares at him. Abruptly a sharp burn bites into his fingertips and he twitches and curses, hurling the cigarette away. It arcs through the dimness, still glowing, and vanishes.

“Me neither,” he says after another moment of silence, just as quiet.

Rick swallows, eyes locked on his boots. “Did you like it?”

They’ve never talked like this, since he met Rick that first day what feels like a lifetime ago. Never. Another _I never,_ and it hits Daryl then how fast they're doing all of this, all these things it turns out none of them have ever done, and how it should feel wrong and so far, when he shoves away his own traitorous brain, none of it actually does.

It all feels so good. It feels good in a way he never would have guessed was possible.

“Yeah. I did.”

He ducks his head and sucks on his burned finger, turning those three words over and over in his head, testing them, tracing their shapes and all their ramifications. He’s so absorbed in it that he doesn't immediately notice when Rick takes his wrist and tugs his hand away, pulls it close, and before he can begin to figure out how to ask Rick what he's doing, Rick’s warm, wet lips have closed around his fingertip.

He gasps. Can't help it. Gasps and twitches, like he's been burned all over again, but Rick is sucking his finger deeper, sweeping his tongue against the pad, his eyes closed and a look on his face like…

He and Rick have never talked like they were, and he's never seen Rick look like he is now. Not even with Beth. Not ever. Like all his focus is narrowed to this one thing, like he's savoring every part of it, like all he wants to be doing in this moment is sucking on Daryl’s finger - like Beth looked with her lips wrapped around Daryl’s cock, and the shudder breaks through the barrier he erected against it and he lets out a weak little moan.

Speaking of _erections._

His own numb lips form Rick’s name, a dry breath of it, as he presses down on Rick’s tongue. Strokes across it. Runs it along the twin ridges of Rick’s teeth, feels the slick smoothness of them, the slicker surface of the inside of his cheek. Rick’s entire mouth, this mouth Daryl was exploring with his own tongue only this afternoon, and he doesn't know how or when he got so close, his brow brushing Rick’s, breath warm on his face and hair tickling at his temple.

Rick uses his tongue to push Daryl’s finger away and out but doesn't release his wrist, clasps it tighter, and Daryl shudders again - because he can perceive a scenario where Rick is using his grip on Daryl’s wrist to pin him, hold him in place, _do things to him,_ and he said he wasn't a faggot but motherfuck if he has the faintest idea anymore.

“I liked it, too,” Rick murmurs, closes the last of the distance and licks his way into Daryl’s mouth.

It was rough before, almost fierce. Needy. Hungry. Rick _took_ him, took him even if he made it very clear that he wanted to be taken. This isn't like that - Rick is slow, maybe even the smallest bit hesitant, his lips and his tongue all gentle force and asking, without words,  _Can I? Is this okay?_

Daryl’s hand finds the nape of Rick’s neck, and he turns his head slightly, lips parting further. Inviting.

Yes, it's very okay.

Rick smiles against him, sighs, releases his wrist only to lay his hands against the sides of Daryl’s jaw and kiss him deeper, steady and strangely affectionate strokes of his tongue, the edges of his teeth. Their quiet groans, rumbling in unison. And it's something about Rick’s hands, something about the way he's touching him - still with none of that roughness, and it's not that Daryl thinks he would _mind_ if Rick was that way with him again, but this is so…

This is so sweet _._

Once this would have gotten him killed. This would have gotten him strung up in a tree and beaten to death with a bat. But that was a different world, very long ago and very far away and over now, and Rick won't hurt him, and Rick won't let anyone else hurt him either.

He's safe.

He loses track of how long it goes on. He doesn't give a shit about the time. Normally he would worry about being seen, but it's getting well onto dark, just about everyone will be inside for the night - and how many people here are likely to _care,_ if it comes to that? What, are _these_ people going to give him shit for it? Are they going to give _Rick_ shit for it? Is this something he has any real reason to give a fuck about?

With a distant twinge a part of him that isn't lost in Rick Grimes’s mouth realizes that this would almost certainly be far less objectionable to everyone down there than what he's been doing with Beth. Than the fact that he's doing anything with Beth at all.

He's not going to think about that. He and Rick are up here alone, none of those people down there matter right now, and he's never - again, never, _never_ \- kissed anyone like this before. Not this kind of slow and careless, lazy, more than a little _messy,_ actually, wrapping his tongue around Rick’s as Rick combs his long fingers into Daryl’s hair and pulls lightly, rubs their faces together, nuzzles at him and drags his lips down Daryl’s jaw to his chin. And just like that he's tilting his head back so Rick can suck at his adam’s apple, and it's insane how easy this is. It's insane how little he has to think about it. It feels like something he was simply waiting to do, like his body already knows what it wants here, only not in anything like the cold mechanical way it knew before he walked into the basement that night. He's so fucking hard, has no idea how long he's been that way, bucking up with a shaky moan when Rick reaches between his legs and cups him, pushes up on his knees, and Daryl turns to meet him as Rick crowds in so close and straddles his thigh, rolling his hips down in a jerky, uneven rhythm.

Rick Grimes is humping his goddamn leg and he wants to bust out laughing, and it wouldn't be hysterical at all.

Mostly.

He _is_ laughing, hooking his fingers under Rick’s belt and encouraging him and on the verge of falling backward and taking Rick with him - and that might be so good to do, lie up here with Rick on top of him and kiss and rub themselves against each other in slow undulations and see where it goes and how long it takes to get there, because he is so _wonderfully_ unafraid of it and he feels like luxuriating in that, but Rick is pulling back with a ragged noise low in his throat, nipping at Daryl’s earlobe.

“Inside,” he gasps. “Now.” Pause, the distinct feeling that he's gathering something, then: “I wanna suck you off.”

_Fuck._

It's common knowledge that the guard tower - removed and more private than a lot of the rest of the prison - has been used for this purpose fairly regularly since everyone moved in, and not only by Maggie and Glenn. It's become a bit of a joke, something you say with everything short of a wink, when you're with someone and everyone knows it - _gonna take guard duty_ \- and people leave you alone when you do. So Daryl is laughing again as he scrambles to his feet, as Rick follows him, because this just keeps getting crazier and crazier and all he can _do_ is laugh, because he's sure as hell not going to try to make it stop.

Not when he can't think of a single reason to do so.

Rick is shoving him backward through the doorway, making him stumble; he catches himself on the wall, gives Rick’s lip a quick bite, and Rick growls and pushes him back, presses in and fumbles with his belt and doesn't stop kissing him. Daryl is dizzy, oxygen starved, like the air has been drained from the room - he _is_ having difficulty getting his breath,  groping mindlessly at Rick’s waist and arms with no goal except to touch him - and this is something he's suddenly _not_ so sure about, how to do that part, what Rick would want and what might be a mistake and what to do with his own body if Rick got his clothes off, and the fact that they technically did that already doesn't feel as if it counts, because then he felt even drunker than he does now. It didn't seem to matter.

But Rick might want to see him naked. Might _want_ to. His gut flips and he whines, whines louder when Rick snakes his fingers into his fly and glides them up and down his shaft. Whispering _oh fuck Rick please_ and moaning thick and helpless as Rick sinks down, one hand running up under the hem of his shirt and over his belly, making his muscles quiver and jump. Fingers and then lips - Rick is pushing his shirt up and dragging kisses across his bare skin, licking at him, long scrapes of his teeth down to his groin, breath so hot on his dick as it springs free and Rick’s hand wrapping around it as his other yanks Daryl’s pants down his thighs.

He feels blindly for Rick’s head. Finds it. Rakes his fingers into thick hair and manages to look down, and it's dim in here, all shadows, but there's the moon and it's bright, flooding in through the window, and Rick’s eyes are glittering in its light as he holds Daryl’s cock around the base and slips the head past his lips.

He can't. His head drops back and he whimpers through his teeth at the ceiling as Rick takes him deeper, licking at him as his lips slide down and down - as soft and warm and wet as they were around his finger, wet like a goddamn pussy, tightening as Rick hollows his cheeks and sucks him. Bizarrely - something else he wouldn't have expected - he can discern in that minuscule remaining lucid part of his mind that Rick is not experienced at this, that he's exploring more than anything, but that couldn't possibly matter; it feels _so fucking good,_ as good as Beth felt if different in so many undefinable little ways, and one thing that's abundantly clear is that Rick fucking _loves this._ Licking him up and down, eager sweeps of his tongue all along Daryl’s shaft, swirling around his head and fluttering the tip at his slit - the pure skill of enthusiasm that Beth possessed when she did this to him in the block, so many of the same things that he loved then, only it’s Rick Grimes on his knees this time, and he has to be dreaming.

If he can just hold off waking up for a while longer.

Rick’s nails are still scratching over his belly and digging into his hips, and he twists and arches, forcing ragged moans through the clenched fist of his throat. His hands are no longer mindless in what they're doing; he's cupping the back of Rick’s head and once more encouraging him, even pushing him as his hips rock forward - and Rick’s affirmative _mmhm_ drifts up to him and he doesn't need translation. Without any deliberation he tightens his hold on Rick’s head and begins to fuck his mouth, shallow and unhurried but less of both as Rick slides his hands around to Daryl’s ass and takes him as deep as he can.

 _“_ Ah, fuck.” It's amazing how coherent he suddenly is. “Shit, Rick, that's so fuckin’ good… oh my God, yeah, just like that, suck my cock, suck my fuckin’ _cock,_ don't you dare stop-”

Faster, faster like Rick clearly wants, and way too soon he's at the edge, hissing as he bottoms out against the back of Rick’s throat. He could try to hold back - except no, no fucking way when he's been hard enough to cut glass for what feels like hours, and he grips the sides of Rick’s head and sobs.

“I'm close, Jesus, you're gonna- Rick, holy _shit,_ you're gonna make me fuckin’-”

He is, stiffening and letting out a strained cry, driving himself forward in a single sharp thrust and spurting his come down Rick’s throat, feeling the muscles work as he swallows.

Then nothing. Quiet. Panting, his and Rick’s and Rick’s hair damp through his fingers, forehead resting against his pubic bone, stars still flickering on and off behind his closed lids as he floats through the delightful aftermath.

And here's Merle, scornfully amused: _Well, lookie here, little brother. Just like I was always afraid of. You want him to stick his dick up your ass, too?_

You know what? Fuck Merle. Fuck all of them, all those cruel assholes who made this into something to hurt someone over. Later he might sink back into the old whirling anxiety again, but right now, he's all defiance: Yeah, maybe he _does_. Maybe he does want that. Basically everything else he's done has felt fantastic, maybe that would be just as good. Maybe it would be _better._

Who the fuck knows.

Rick moves. Groans as he pushes to his feet, a shadow in the moonlight, the barest hint of spit-sheen on swollen lips. He's so close again, leaning in, and Daryl raises his hands and frames Rick’s face and wonders vaguely why a gentle ache is blooming in his chest.

He doesn't have to understand anything. He draws Rick in and nudges his lips apart, licks at them - tastes faintly bitter salt on his tongue and knows that he's kissing his own come out of Rick’s mouth.

So he shivers and moans and does exactly that.

Rick jumps when Daryl wriggles a hand between them, laughs in a trembling huff of breath, releases his own moan when Daryl cups him and kneads with the heel of his palm. Still hard, as much as before - he hasn't come, and just like Beth should have, definitely given that she had been so kind to him, the same rules apply here.

He's still not completely sure what to do. It's a cock, yeah, and it's not like he doesn't have one as well, and the differences here can't be especially stark - but it's not the same, not really, and he leans his brow against Rick’s and fingers his belt buckle, and feels unaccountably shy.

Ridiculous, given everything. But he does.

“Show me what you like.” His face is burning, and he's so glad Rick can't see. Not that he expects judgment, but that's not the point. “Rick… Please.”

The curve of Rick’s smile against the corner of his mouth, and Rick takes his hand and shows him.

All the frantic hurry is gone and everything is back to that lazy pace it ran at before. They don't have anywhere to go. They don't have any reason to rush. Except to get Rick off, but he doesn't seem to want that. He slips his belt loose, eases his own fly down and guides Daryl’s fingers inside, moans softly when Daryl closes his hand around his shaft and frees him. He lays his hand over the back of Daryl’s, fingers stroking against his knuckles, withdraws only long enough to spit into his palm and slick himself. He's cut, unlike Daryl, and that's new, but really it only takes him a minute or two to be sure that he doesn't need Rick to give him much in the way of guidance after all.

But he doesn't bat Rick away. He likes this, likes the way Rick is using Daryl’s hand on himself, working it up and down and fucking into Daryl’s fist in slow, easy thrusts. Like his hands, he's longer than Daryl and not as thick, the smooth texture of his skin different in ways Daryl can't pinpoint, the weight of him and the way he twitches when Daryl tightens his grip. He shouldn't be surprised but it feels good to jerk Rick off like this, leaning on each other in the guard tower with the cool night breeze ghosting over their skin, kissing him as slow as his hand and sucking on his lips, his tongue, licking up every last trace of himself and coming back for more.

He knows Rick is close when the tension winds up in the core of his muscles and rolls out in a fine tremble, the low sounds humming in his throat and chest rising in pitch and tone. And as before he somehow locates words and says them, words he never would have believed he would spontaneously _say_ even if he had ever been able to conceive of doing this, murmuring into Rick’s ear _shit, yeah, come now, you come for me,_ and Rick obeys him, a collapse into waves of shuddering as he spills hot and slippery all over Daryl’s wrist and their joined fingers and spatters onto the flaking boards.

And again, stillness. Inside; outside too. Rick is loosening against him, heaving breath but relaxing, cock going soft in Daryl’s hand. Everything soft. Everything easy.

_Sweet._

_~_

Yet again Daryl isn't sure how much time passes before they pull apart, clean up as best they can, emerge from the shelter. They don't descend immediately; instead Rick goes to the railing and braces his hands on it, tips his head back and closes his eyes. The moonlight is edging him in silver, the outlines of his features, his shoulders, his hair like filigree. Daryl stands back, closer to the shelter’s doorway, and looks at him - takes the time to do so without fear of being caught or questioned, though he wouldn't be surprised if Rick knows what he's doing.

He should be scared. Even now, he really should. Today he plunged into a multitude of deep ends, and he has no reason to be confident that he can swim.

Except he's not swimming in there alone.

Anyway, he's not scared. He's looking at Rick, gaze moving over him like his hands did, and that ache is working its way back to his chest, and he still doesn't understand it.

Except he felt like this looking at Beth when he met her in the block that day. When he watched her coming toward him with the sunlight soaking her and running off the ends of her hair. It hurt him, looking at her then.

Looking at Rick is hurting him now.

Rick draws a breath - long and deep - and turns to him, the light catching the corner of his lips, another smile. Small, oddly thoughtful, and full of something else Daryl can't name.

“I'm gonna stay up here for a bit,” he says, low. As if he's trying not to rouse something. “You go on.”

And Daryl almost says no. Almost says that he wants to stay, that he’ll stay as long as Rick does, that if he goes down there it'll be him alone again and he won't be able to go near Beth, and all that will be waiting for him is his solitary bunk, cold and with only his own body to warm it. That he'll stay here with Rick all night, that he might like that very much, that they don't even have to do anything but sit like they were before, side by side. Not talking unless they want to. Just _being._

The knowledge comes to him that this is not a new thing for him to want. But until now it was background. He never openly acknowledged it to himself, much less imagined he might have it.

He doesn’t. He doesn't say anything. He nods and steps past Rick toward the ladder. But before he gets there, he feels the brush of a hand on his, fingers briefly intertwining.

Gone too soon.

He goes to his bunk. It's as cold as he thought it would be, and he warms it as well as he usually does - he's a fucking blast furnace, always has been - but it's not enough and the bunk feels bigger than it should, and he turns onto his side and reaches between his legs and traces the outline of his half-erection as he thinks about Beth’s hair and skin and her pussy, Rick’s hands and the thrumming shaft of his cock, their mouths and how they taste. When he might get to taste them again.

Every part of this feels so good. Except for the parts where they have to say goodnight.

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the run, Beth - troubled by what she asked Daryl and Rick to do together and by the possibility that she's finally gone too far - finds it impossible to sleep. She's not the only one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELP THIS THING GREW A PLOT OH GOD
> 
> Yet another non-porn interlude between porn chapters. I have the one after this roughly planned but I felt like we needed to check in with Beth before we went any further. Because yeah. Girl's been through a lot. 
> 
> ❤️

She didn't plan it, actually. Not that part.

It would be reasonable to supposed that she's shocked herself before now. She has. Jerking Rick off in the rain up against the prison wall - of course. Letting him go down on her in her cell - definitely. Letting him bend her over and fuck her in the basement, letting Daryl fuck her mouth, her _first time_ with two rough men who handled her so roughly and loving every second of it - absolutely. Getting down on her knees in the empty block with Daryl, asking him to fuck her up against the bars, standing there while he ate her out like she was the most delicious thing he's ever tasted - bet your ass.

But then.

In the backseat all the way home, silent. Watching the backs of their heads as if she could somehow determine what they're thinking that way. Trying to catch Rick’s eye in the mirror and failing. Feeling her gut jitter and churn, because _what if she went too far._ Because _what the hell was she_ _thinking_.

The way they were with her, after. How they took her pussy and her mouth and fucked her until she was sobbing, and how they held her between them when they were done. Didn't seem like they had a problem with it. Seemed like the polar opposite. But now they're so quiet and she isn't sure, and any question she might voice about whether they're okay is hopelessly crowded into the top of her throat.

After a while, she's gripped by the awful suspicion that she should offer some kind of apology.

_I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. It just came out. I looked at_ you _with_ him _like that and it just came out, it was an accident, maybe it was wrong._

Maybe.

But God, it was so beautiful. They were so beautiful together. She never could have imagined until it was right in front of her.

Later, lying awake in her cell, on her back with her fingers plucking distractedly at the sheet and the frayed hem of her shorts. _Maybe it was wrong._ She blinks into the darkness, gnawing at her lip, feeling the tidal rush of her breath in and out of her lungs. Maybe it was. Their mouths arching, moving over each other, the glimpses of their tongues and the wet, slick sounds as they kissed. Hard bodies pressed together, their cocks grinding and the roll of their hips, their low groans. Rick was hungry for it. It was like she finally gave him permission to do something for which he had been aching, for God knows how long.

Like she broke something open inside him.

She knows how it is. How it was. Daddy never made a point of it but she remembers the flares of hellfire in Pastor James’s sermons when certain laws were made and others were overturned, certain things were in the news. Nothing so direct as a call-out, but stern allusions that were intelligible enough to everyone in the pews. Not only did Daddy never make a point of it, but now and then she caught a tightness in his mouth that suggested to her that he might not be in complete agreement with those positions. But she never asked. You don't talk about those kinds of things.

You also don't fuck two men at once in a prison basements and shamelessly lie by omission after. Yet here we are.

She interrupts that steady pull and heaves a sigh, slings an arm across her eyes. Goddammit, she was having so much _fun_.

But how is it hurting anyone? How is it hurting her? It's not like she doesn't want to. She's eighteen, for Christ’s sake. So it came out of nowhere, so she's been struggling to get her breath and fighting a whole new brand of vertigo. So what? It feels good - it feels amazing. It feels better than anything has felt in a while. It's like the first time she fired a gun. She's reaching out and seizing something, gripping it in her hands and discovering just how strong those hands are. Jimmy was sweet and good to her and she maybe could have stayed with him and been happy enough, but Jimmy never gave her anything to _grab_.

She's gasping and dizzy and part of her is continually shocked by herself even as she dives through this with increasingly intense abandon, and she has two grown men wrapped around her finger, she simply must, because look at what happened, _look at what she made them do._

And what happens now?

The silence in the car. The dense, heavy silence. The greater silence within which that silence rests. She explained it to Daryl, she figures Rick’s reasons for keeping it quiet are similar if not identical, but they're all _lying,_ and how much further can this go?

What does she really want? What do they?

More. She said _more_.

Another sigh, voice weaving through it on the way out and thickening it into a frustrated moan as she kicks off the sheets and shoves herself up to sit. She can't do this. She's eating herself from the tail inward, and there's no way in hell she's sleeping tonight. Even if she played a mental highlight reel of the past week and got herself off, she can't see how that wouldn't merely make it all worse - though as she swings her legs over the edge of the bunk and pushes to her feet, it's impossible to ignore how wet she is.

Wet and pulsing hot. The seam of her shorts grazes her clit when she takes a step toward the cell door and her eyes flutter closed.

What these men have both done to - and for - her pussy. What they might yet do, if she hasn't ruined the whole deal.

Still in her shorts and camisole, she pads barefoot out into the block, the soft scuffle of her passage largely obscured by the murmurs and snores of the others. As she crosses through the shadows beneath the catwalk, the moon is high and streaming in through the barred windows, painting iron and steel and concrete in milky stripes. Painting her; she steps briefly into the light and watches the black and pale lines moving across her skin, and she thinks about their hands.

Clasping her. Moving her how they want her. Bending her over and yanking her legs apart and holding her down.

If she doesn't get it together she's going to start dripping down her damn _thighs_.

Daryl’s cell is at the other end of the block, and as she approaches, she can't see any light beyond what the moon is throwing. Can't see light, can't hear stirring - but he's awake. Very. She could never explain how she senses it, but the feeling is there, as if his alertness is a light in itself, tiny and flickering behind the curtain drawn across the door.

Maybe she's not the only one who can't leave herself alone.

She stops in front of the curtain, abruptly uncertain about how to proceed. Knock on the bars? Whisper? Sound carries out here - though of the few people who might also be wakeful, who would be able to tell what it is? Who would mark it enough to care? Someone up and moving around at night isn't all that unusual.

And she wouldn't be the first one to make a discreet late-night visit to someone else’s cell. Not by any means. There are a lot of things they've all learned to ignore with determined politeness.

It's a different world.

That doesn't solve her immediate problem, though, and she's about to hurl caution to the wind and tap on one of the crossbars as lightly as she can when the curtain slips aside and there he is, in a worn tank top and boxer shorts, staring at her with his eyes lost in one of those bands of shadow.

Despite the fact that she can't see his eyes, she returns the stare, and then her gaze travels down his body and back up and she finds herself looking away a bit hastily. Which is _ridiculous,_ utterly _laughable,_ but she's overwhelmed by the feeling that he's somehow more exposed right now than when he was fully naked and balls-deep inside her. And it occurs to her that even then, she didn't really see him. He stripped for the sake of convenience and because by that point the entire thing was like a snowball rolling downhill in some old cartoon, picking up entire trees and shrieking skiers as it went. He didn't strip because he wanted them to see him. And she didn't.

And suddenly that seems like a shame.

She swallows, her hands fidgeting with each other in front of her. It's incomprehensible, this awkwardness, when they're doing nothing more than standing here _looking_ at each other, and yet she can't shake it, and he's feeling it every bit as much as she is. It's as if they're doing this all backwards. He started out by fucking her mouth and eating her pussy and now they're relegated to shy and mostly clothed silence, neither of them sure what to do next. Hell, she's not even sure why she's here. It wasn't any kind of plan. It was what she's been doing from the beginning: going with her gut - and other parts of her - and dealing with the consequences when the consequences are impossible to avoid.

Her daddy raised her to be so prudent.

Well. She can start. She meets his semi-visible gaze and offers him a faint smile. “Hi.”

He grunts, and that's all she gets. But his non-verbal communication is still expressive - sometimes far more than anything he actually says - and she can interpret it well enough. It's a greeting, when he doesn't feel confident enough to say hello. He's not mad at her for being here. She hasn't done something he actively didn't want.

He's confused, though. Which only seems rational.

She takes hold of her arm with her opposite hand, steps closer. He tenses minutely, but doesn't step back, and when she feels him studying her, she realizes that where she is, the moonlight illuminates her with much greater clarity than him. He's looking her over, but she can't detect any lust in it. He's merely trying to gather information.

Maybe he thinks she came here because she wants something from him.

Something about that inward characterization is deeply unsettling. As if she came here to be _serviced_. That's not how she wanted this to go, not even when she started to understand what her position actually affords her. She's been taking her share of pleasure from both of them, but she never…

It's what she said to him in the basement that first night. _You don't have to_.

“I can't sleep,” she murmurs, and stops there. She can't sleep… and? What precisely does she expect him to do about that? But he's already stepping back and holding the curtain open for her, inviting her in with a minute jerk of his head.

So she goes.

~

She's been in his cell before. All of them have been in each other’s cells at one time or another, even if only in the doorway. Privacy at the prison is loosely defined at best, and most people don't leave their curtains closed during the day. But she's never been in his cell like _this,_ at night and alone with him with hours of filthier sex than she ever imagined she'd have sitting between them. An elephant lurking in the corner of his tiny room.

And that's when she's sure that she's not here for it. She's not here to get that from him. If he wants to, that's one thing, but if not…

She doubts he would. She doubts very much that he would make the first move. Rick might grab her and shove her onto the bunk and haul her shorts down, but not Daryl.

Could be right now that restraint is exactly what she does want.

He looks at her for a few seconds more, then turns away and bends over the low stack of crates by the bunk that serves as a nightstand. She hears the _scritch_ of a match and the hiss as it goes up, the lower flare as the flame settles into the wick of the candle. Yet when he turns back to her, she can't see him any better. If anything, the shadows that conceal half of him are even darker, hard contrast against the dim red-gold that outlines the muscles of his arms and shoulders.

He seems so _big_.

She feels nothing but safe.

A tiny snap and a flick of his fingers. Broken the match in half and let the pieces fall to the floor. It's an odd action and it catches and holds her attention, until he clears his throat.

She can't dance around this forever.

“I wanted…” She takes a breath and starts again. “About today. With Rick. What you and him…” Shit. She can _do_ the stuff in question, she can act like a completely shameless _slut,_ but when it comes to talking about it, she's at a blushing loss. If Daryl is at all freaked out by this, by any of it, she's probably not helping matters by stumbling over her own feet, and even if-

No. To hell with this. There's only one thing she really cares about, underneath all the rest of the bullshit. So she’ll ask it.

“Are you alright?”

He blinks. His mouth does something she can't interpret, and she's worried. But then he ducks his head and she can interpret what she's seeing, because what she's seeing is the tiniest smile in the world. And what he's doing is nodding.

“What you did. With him.” It's coming now, even if it's clumsy. “I was scared maybe you didn't. Y’know. Wanna do it.”

“I wanted to do it,” he says quietly, and she's not positive she's ever heard him talk like that. Calm. He's not confessing something. He doesn't sound as if he's conflicted by the fact. Whatever else he might be wrestling with, _what he did_ with Rick doesn't appear to be part of it.

“Oh.”

He wanted it. He wanted to kiss a man like that. He wanted to kiss _Rick_ like that, in front of her. With her watching. With her enjoying it like she so obviously was.

She battles back the urge to break into absurd laughter.

“It's fuckin’ weird,” he adds, and his smile grows by a fraction of an inch, turns a little wry. As if he knows that what he's saying is a massive understatement, which he almost certainly does. If anyone is aware of how inadequate words can be, it's Daryl Dixon.

Soft laugh. Perhaps slightly absurd. “Yeah. It really is.” And before she knows what she's doing, she's reaching up and laying her hands against his cheeks, pushing up on her toes to press her lips against his. Light and almost chaste, and she feels him hesitate before his own hands find her hips and rest there. Rick is a _beast,_ and Daryl is clearly capable of being one too, but there's such a sweetness in him that she doesn't quite know what to do with.

Maybe she doesn't have to do anything.

She pulls back, though she's still framing his face. His eyes glitter in the candlelight as he gazes down at her, and she knows that if she dropped a hand between them and felt for him, he would be hardening.

But she won't. Not now.

“Can I stay?” Whisper. She's nervous, whether or not she should be. “Just… just tonight, I don't wanna actually _do_ anythin’, I mean, unless you wanna, I just want-”

He stops her with his mouth, just as light and just as near-chaste, but she loosens under it and releases a little moan. She should have guessed that this would be okay. She should have had that much faith in him.

He's a good man.

“Stay,” he breathes, and she's sure: he wanted her to do this the second she came to him. If not before.

It's bizarre how natural it feels, sliding into his bunk beside him when he lies down and pulls back the covers. His sheets are like hers: worn and correspondingly soft, and he's warm, pouring it over her as she presses closer to him. Another one of those half moments of tension before he curls an arm around her waist, still the smallest bit hesitant but relaxing more all the time. She leans up to the candle, and in the second before she blows it out, she sees the rest of the cell - a pile of folded clothes and his bow leaning up against the wall, a few books and some more candles on a shelf, utilitarian and spartan but neater than one might expect, albeit in a disheveled sort of way. No decoration to speak of but with a kind of comfort pervading everything that's impossible to pin down.   
  
It's a cliché that the spaces people make to live in are outward expressions of who they are. But it's also frequently true.

In the dark, she turns in his arms and snuggles against him. As she suspected, his erection is pressing into her belly, but he doesn't seem to notice - or if he does, he doesn't consider it important. He simply runs his fingers through her hair and presses his knee between hers, and when she slings her arm over his middle and tucks her head under his chin, she knows she’ll be able to sleep. She'll have to set an internal alarm and sneak out before the rest of the block stirs, but that's hours away. Until then…

“Thank you,” she whispers against his throat. He grunts.

He doesn't have to say anything more.

But before she falls asleep, she's thinking. He wanted to kiss a man. He wanted to kiss Rick. In front of her, for her, but also he _wanted_ it, he's not afraid to tell her so, and if he wants that?

If he wants that, what else might he want? 


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So whatever this is, it's definitely a Thing. Rick knows that. It's not difficult to accept. Now that it's established, he wants to start to find out just how far all three of them can take it. But he's in for a surprise or two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I honestly can't decide whether this thing wants to be character-heavy or just about the filth, and I guess it probably doesn't matter either way. So please enjoy and let me know if you did. ❤️

He stays up in the tower for a long time after Daryl goes down, leaning on the railing and watching the few stars the moonlight allows emerge from the blue-black, flickering and cold.

There's a lot here that he doesn't understand. Really almost everything. That was always true - that was basically true before any of the rest of this tumbled into being - but he's feeling it in a way he never has before: something frantic and wild beating its wings against the inside of him, desperate to get free without any idea what _freedom_ might consist of. He should be panicking within the confusion; instead he's exhilarated, as if he's looking down at the silent prison yard and the few scattered walkers staggering and grumbling beyond the fences, and he's thinking he might climb on top of the railing and jump.

Leap into the night with the taste of Daryl’s lips and cock lingering on his tongue.

He's jumped off pretty much every other edge. What's one more?

No. It's not like that. He's currently being reckless about a lot of things, but not his own damn life. He breathes a laugh, lowers his head and gazes down at his hands where they dangle loose and relaxed over the bar where he's braced his elbows. He wants to live. He wanted to live before but now he _wants_ it, he's ravenous for it, the kind of life that seizes and drags into itself and consumes. That finds what it wants and takes it. For fucking months his focus has been on everything and everyone but himself, and he's damned if he's going to be a shitty father, that absolutely must always come first, but for the rest of it…

This girl. This man.

Both of them.

A band of cool, smooth hardness under his left thumb, and he hisses a breath as it strikes him. He doesn't think about it much anymore. It's merely a part of him. But he still can't bear to take it off even now, and having done what he's done, having _become what he's become,_ he can't turn away from it, or it from him. Before, it was Shane sagely advising him to find himself _a piece of ass._ Some _pussy._ Not some grand love affair. Thought that's what he had found, but now, oh, now he's not so sure. He's not so sure _what_ this is. If there's even a name for it.

He raises his head, stares up at the moon. Whispers.

“You wouldn't want me to be alone. I know that.”

The moon says nothing. Neither does the ring. Fucking stupid, of course he didn't expect them to do so, but. He shakes his head again, lets it fall between his shoulders. Huffs a laugh at himself. He's losing his fucking mind, and he doesn't need the evidence of the last twelve hours or so to prove that.

But it doesn't feel bad. He doesn't feel bad. He's utterly appalling, what he wants and what he's allowing himself to have, but he doesn't feel _bad._ He thinks about the aftermath in the living room, on the couch, Beth’s loose body held between them, how wearily happy she seemed. How well she fit there. Looking at her, her gleaming form curled against Daryl’s broad, scarred chest. The pulse fluttering in Daryl’s throat as he tipped his head back. The memory of that flutter under Rick’s tongue.

Fingertips grazing his. Rough - and soft.

That was good. Just that much was so good.

If he wants some kind of benediction from a ghost, he's not going to get that. If he wants permission - Christ, if he wants _approval_ \- that's sure as shit not going to be forthcoming, even in a world where the dead get up and walk. But for the first time in a long time, he's alone with himself and he feels calm. About all of it. It might merely be another indication of how far he's fallen, how he's way past too far gone, but the last needles of guilt have withdrawn themselves. What he's left with is that same seething hunger pulsing through his veins and straight to his dick, a mad kaleidoscope of all the things he could do to them and make them do to him, to each other…

But that's not _all_ he’s left with. No.

The wind sweeps out of the trees, combs through his hair. He lifts his head and closes his eyes into it. Like always, it carries a faint whiff of decay, but the greater part of it is deep green and growing. There's no cloud now, but he's smelling the memory of rain.

He climbs down from the tower and walks silently back to the block, and it's not difficult to fall asleep.

And if that says something awful about him, he no longer cares.

~

So like before, nothing much is different for a few days after that. Only everything is.

No outside observer would notice. He's confident of that, and therefore he feels safe. It’s far too subtle, what's happening between them now - him and her, him and _him._ Unspoken, and most of the time exchanged without touch. A few seconds of proximity in passing her, or running into her at the kitchen in the yard, asking her to take care of Judith for an afternoon just as smooth as you please, like he's never laid a hand on her. Never even dreamed of it. Not dreaming of it now, not lying in his cell at night with his cock slick in his hand and furiously jerking off with images of her pert little nipples and the gleaming pink of her pussy running on a delightfully maddening loop in his head.

Like she's not so lovely that it hurts to look at her, the graceful curve of her hip and waist and her slender hands and her legs as powerful and delicate as a doe’s. Her mischievously dancing eyes. Like she's not so lovely that he wishes he could devour her with his own eyes, pin her down with his gaze and flush her cheeks and neck scarlet.

Like she's not so sweet that it takes everything in him to keep from reaching out to stroke her glowing cornsilk hair back from her face, press his thumb against her full lips and watch her smile.

And then there's Daryl. Oh, yes, there is most certainly Daryl.

He has no idea whether that's easier or far more difficult, because the conventional patterns of his day bring them together so much more frequently. Innocuous, minor conversations about logistics, and it's not like Rick is in charge of much of anything these days aside from the field and the pigs, but it would look weird if he steered clear of Daryl altogether, and in any case there's no reason to. It's not as if he's in some kind of danger of losing control of himself, pouncing on him and dragging Daryl’s dick out of his jeans right in the middle of the yard.

And it's not as if he _wants_ to steer clear, because Christ, he's never looked at a man like this before in his goddamn life.

Scarcely looking; stealing tiny glances when he knows he can get away with the hunger that has to be  visible in his eyes. The rest of the time it's normal eye contact, normal everything, but it's impossible to ignore the broadness of his shoulders, muscles flexing in his bare arms when he lifts crates or the bow or messes around with his bike. The sweat-sheen on his skin and the fantasy of licking it off bearing down like a hot weight. The inviting hollow between his collarbones, perfect place to dip your tongue into if you happen to be so inclined. His thick fingers and his scarred, paw-like hands and the way he knows those hands can be gentle, even nervous - and the scars, the scars Rick saw on the rest of him, which he always knew were there but which he's never truly _seen._ Didn't really take the time to see Daryl stripped at all, when he had the chance, and _that_ has to change.

What's between Daryl’s legs, and knowing how well it fits into his mouth. The salty taste of him and his pleasantly musky smell. The precise texture of his come.

His cheekbones, half concealed by his hair, the way their angles cut down his face when the light catches him just right. The strange blue clarity of his eyes.

He never realized before how beautiful Daryl Dixon is. And that seems like a shame.

He wonders if Daryl has any idea.

The thing is, he knew what to do with his lust. It was disturbing as hell, freaked him out but good, but on the deepest level he understood it. He understood what it was pushing him toward, horrifying or no. At the end of the day, fucking isn't all that complicated.

This, though.

He's thinking of them and jerking off in his cell, biting back his groans and shooting sticky ropes of come all over his hand and belly. He's doing that, sure.

But that's not all he's doing.

~

He's wondering how long it can last, this pretense of normality. He's not in any hurry to disrupt it, tortuously needy masturbation sessions or no. The torture is nice, nicer than he would have imagined. The need is nice. Everything he wants being so tantalizingly close and yet so far unreachable is nice. The secrecy, the fear of being exposed which used to haunt him now serving to add a wicked edge of danger.

But he also knows it's not sustainable. So a few days later they stop trying to sustain it at all.

It's sunset. Sitting on the steps that lead into the yard, plastic cup of water in his hand and sweat cooling on his brow. The water is cool too, sliding down his throat, fresh from the rain barrel. Everything is bathed in a deep red-gold, streams of it breaking through the trees and falling in bronze stripes across the grass. It makes the air itself look like honey, like he could put out his tongue and lap up its sweetness.

And her a few yards away, Judith in her arms. Walking back and forth, singing quietly. He can't make out the words but he can hear the lilt of her voice and he can see her perfectly well, her hair flowing out from her ponytail like a spring, her bare shoulders and the muscles of her arms revealed by her tank top. Always those tight jeans, clinging to her thighs and ass like the denim is his hands. He watches her, his fingertips playing around the rim of the cup, and it feels even more twisted to think about her like this as she's holding his daughter, and that makes it even better in a way he's not going to bother to fight.

Better stay seated for a while longer, hide the bulge in his pants. While he imagines away Judith, imagines away everyone and everything else and leaves only the two of them, so he can throw her down in the grass and wrench her legs apart, fuck her into the damn ground as she moans and cries and claws the rich dark earth under her fingernails.

He'd bet everything he has that she _knows_ he's watching her. Knows the filthy things she's making him think.

_Slut._

The squeak of the door’s hinges and the scuff of a boot behind him, and without turning to look he immediately knows who it is. Daryl stands silent behind him for a few seconds, then steps forward and leans on the rusty iron rail, and there's the scritch of the match as he lights the cigarette dangling from his lip.

Rick watches him exhale a lazy stream of smoke between his lips, and suddenly there's a whole new reason for that bulge in his pants.

Christ. As causes go, he's beyond lost.

He says nothing. Waits. He's content to let Daryl decide how this conversation is going to start, how it's going to go. It _will_ go; of that much he's certain. This isn't going to be another of those innocuous exchanges. They're both looking at - and seeing - the same thing.

And in the end it doesn't take much in the way of words. Which shouldn't surprise him. With Daryl, there never are very many of those.

Soft grunt. “She's lookin’ good.” He pauses. “Our girl.”

Rick releases a breath. It's not like a switch has been flipped so much as two conducting ends have touched and a circuit has been completed, and electricity is crackling and sparking through.

“Yeah. She is.”

For another moment or two, nothing. Then he goes ahead, jumps into what's been on his mind for the last couple of nights. What he did early one morning when he was sure he wouldn't be noticed. Because while he didn't know, he sensed it was worth preparing.

“I got a mattress down in the generator room.” He glances up, a smile playing around the corners of his mouth. It feels like an evil smile. “From the block we just cleared out.”

No sense in making her more uncomfortable than he wants her to be.

“After everything quiets down?”

Daryl nods, blows smoke again. Casual, as if Rick has just suggested a quick run or an afternoon hunting trip, like nothing whatsoever to remark on. Another grunt; he's not looking down, but Rick knows his smile is seen. “I'll get her there.”

She's turning, spotting them. Smiling and giving them a little wave.

“Great,” Rick murmurs.

~

Waiting, seated on the mattress and watching the odd shadows the lantern throws onto the floor and wall shifting with every tiny movement, it occurs to him that he might be less twitchy if he tore a page out of Daryl’s book and took up smoking.

A wry smile plucks at his lips. Carl would be scandalized. _Beth_ would be goddamn scandalized. She sure as hell wouldn't approve. Daryl is Daryl but Rick Grimes is a decent family man - no matter what he does in the shadows - with children and a place in a community, and that's a role he has to keep playing.

With this, apparently, as an escape valve.

The mattress is clean—no one appears to have died on it, anyway, and it's free of mold, and he's reasonably confident that the few spots of discoloration are merely from age and long use. In a moment of decency he debated fitting a sheet over it, making it a little nicer for her, and promptly nixed the idea. He doesn't want to give her _nicer._ That's never been what this is about. From the beginning this was about bending her own and jamming her cheek against rusty metal, yanking her skirt up and ramming his dick into her.

A sheet is too nice for her. What he's going to do to her, he's going to do on the floor on an old bare mattress with the lantern casting hard stripes of light and dark across them. Like straps. Like binding.

That gives him so many ideas.

He's sitting with his knees drawn up and his forearms resting on them, facing the door, fighting the urge to reach down and palm himself. Better to go ahead and ride the simmer - and anyway he doesn't have to ride it long, because there's the echoing sound of footfalls out there in the corridor, and then a whimper choked off with what he imagines is a hand slapped over her mouth.

And there she is.

In her green camisole and gray sleep shorts - same ones she was wearing the night he came to her cell and ate her out. Her hair untied and falling tangled around her shoulders, one strap of the camisole slipping down her upper arm - the arm Daryl has twisted up behind her back. So immediately Rick’s whirling imagination provides him with a film reel prologue: Innocent girl asleep in her cell until a big, rough man bursts in on her, seizes her and drags her out of her cozy bed, hisses at her to keep her mouth shut or she’ll be sorry. Marches her down here with one hand gripping her wrist and the other on the back of her neck - and now, as he thought, over her mouth, her eyes wide above.

Gorgeous.

Daryl releases her with a sudden shove at the same moment Rick pushes to his feet, and she stumbles toward him, trips over her own bare feet and literally collapses into his arms. He's chuckling, holding her up and against his chest, and looking over her shoulder at Daryl’s glowering face.

Ruthless hunger in the dark pits of his eyes. So much kindness in him, not far beneath the surface, but Rick doesn't see any of it there now. He's one of two very bad men, and out of the night they've snatched themselves a toy to play with.

And as he lowers his gaze to her upturned one and catches her eyes, he sees a flicker there and at the corner of her mouth. It's only for a fraction of a second but he reads it plain as speaking. The playful, faintly sardonic amusement.

_Took you assholes long enough._

He gives her a smile and the tiniest of nods, cups her cheek and strokes his thumb along it. Her blood is thrumming beneath her skin, the same frequency as his. “Aw, honey. Was he mean to you?”

She sniffles, nuzzles against his hand though her eyes are glittering with mock-fear - and something about it stirs some creature even further down in his depravity, one of those hideous deep-sea fish all vicious teeth. How innocent and young she looks like this.

How very, very young.

“Please,” she breathes, her hands groping for his waist and then his shirt, clearly with no intent other than to find something to hold onto. “Rick, he…”

Not an affirmative, not a plea for him to stop or for them to let her go. He does what his fantasies allowed him to do and presses the pad of his thumb against her lips, feels the way they yield to him, imagines the rest of her flesh yielding the same. Another glance up and past her; Daryl is moving toward them, almost stalking, his head lowered. Bestial.

It would be interesting to know how much of this is a role he's playing and how much of it is something that's been lurking inside him this entire time.

“He was just doing what I told him to, baby. I didn't tell him to get pushy, but I think you kinda like that. Don't you?” His gentle, stroking hand snaps shut on her jaw, pressing her cheeks against her teeth. Another one of those muffled whimpers and his dick strains helplessly against his zipper. “Yeah, you slut. You like it rough. Maybe that's how we’re gonna do this. If we want to.”

A soft grunt, and then all at once the last of the distance between them and Daryl has disappeared, and he's standing right there behind her, trapping her with his body. She lets out a little squeal as Daryl closes his thick hands around her arms and pulls them back, not far enough to hurt - much - but enough to arch her back and lift her chest into the air. The worn cotton of her camisole stretches across her frame and presents her small tits to him, her nipples hardened and peaking the fabric.

The way it felt to suck them. Flick them with his tongue, roll them gently back and forth between his teeth.

His hands have settled there almost before he realizes that he's moving, cupping her through the camisole and stroking those little nubs as he pushes her back into Daryl’s shadow. Daryl rumbles, a sound both lower and richer than a growl, and when Rick shifts his gaze from hers to his, what he sees there glitters in the darkness like a scatter of stars.

Stars look so cold, but if you get close enough they'll burn you down to ash.

“Hold her,” he says quietly, and as Daryl nods and tightens his grip on her arms, Rick thrusts his hands under the hem of her camisole and jerks it upward.

It's somewhat awkward, with Daryl needing to alter his grip, grabbing her again in a flash of movement as if he expects her to make a break for it. Which maybe he does, in this half-fiction they seem to be spinning between the three of them. She releases another whimper as they briskly strip her to the waist and Rick clamps his hands back over her tits and kneads.

But he eases up for just a few seconds as he leans in and brushes his lips against hers, light. He feels her loosen, her sternum rising and falling as she exhales. “Don't have to be mean to you, sweetheart,” he whispers, teasing her nipples with slow circles of his thumbs. “You just do what I say.” His eyes once more flick up to Daryl’s. “What we say.”

She gulps. Nods.

“That's a good girl.” One hand dropping, maneuvering its way to her crotch to awkwardly cup her there. He needs more room, wants to really _look_ at her anyway, but having her like this, so small and trapped and helpless, it's too delicious to break away from yet. He kneads her mound the way he kneaded her tit, and she sighs and sags in Daryl’s hold, her head lolling back against Daryl’s chest and her lips trembling.

“She wet?” Daryl’s hushed, rasping voice like nails down his spine; he wrestles back his own shiver - and then figures there's no reason to, nothing to hide, and even if he wants to be in charge here…

He wants Daryl to know what he can do.

“I imagine so.” His hand slides lower, fingers searching for - and finding - the damp spot on her shorts, and he breathes a laugh as he presses and she moans. “You been wet since he grabbed you, haven't you? _Haven't_ you?” A little yelp bursts out of her as he pinches her nipple and twists. “You tell me.”

“I've…” Her throat works as she swallows, tries again. “I was wet.”

“For us, girl?” Daryl noses behind her ear, and once again there's something fundamentally wolfish about it. Rick’s chest hitches.

He's not the only predator here.

“Yeah. For you.” Her legs spread wider and she cants her hips upward, pushing against Rick’s palm. “Please, I want-”

This time his laugh is a lot more than a breath. It's still quiet, but it starts so deep in him, starts at the root of his cock and ripples up his spine, and he wriggles his fingers into one leg of her shorts, spider-walking them over her bush and hovering just above where she needs him. “Oh, honey. You tell us what you want. You ask us nice, we can make you feel so good.”

“I want you to fuck me,” she whispers - hisses as he gives her another cruel pinch.

“Didn't catch that.”

“I want you to _fuck me._ ” She whines it through her bared teeth, and it's not as loud as he would like to make it, but though they're well removed from the occupied part of the prison, sound does carry. And he can't exactly tell someone that this isn't precisely what it looks like.

He finally takes pity on her, lays gentle fingertips against her swollen clit and presses again, and she moans, slowly rolls her entire body in way that makes him think of a stripper on a pole. 

Maybe they can make her do that sometime. The pole might be a bit of a tall order, but they can all be flexible.

“You think we should do that, Daryl?” He leans over her shoulder, and all at once his lips are brushing Daryl’s, not enough to be a kiss but so close, so easy to do it if they decided they wanted to. His fingers haven't stopped working her, finding a steady circling pace that has her hips moving in time and her breath coming in shallow pants. “You think she asked nice enough?”

Abruptly she squirms, and he's about to tell her to keep herself still or she’ll regret it, but then he feels her own clever fingers on him, tracing the straining outline of his cock through his jeans. “Please,” she gasps, and he wants to eat her up like the wolf Daryl is reminding him of. “Please, I want you both so bad…”

Daryl growls, blatantly amused. “She said please.”

“So she did.” And there's really no reason not to, nothing to hold off for; he takes the last couple of centimeters and closes his mouth over Daryl’s - brief, more a preview than anything else, but it’s enough to set his head spinning, and harder when Daryl’s teeth catch his lower lip.

This isn't going to be difficult. He's not going to have to do any coaxing.

“You choose,” Rick murmurs, and it’s like every syllable is another kiss. His hands are on her but for this moment, all his attention is focused knife-edged on the man behind her. “You tell me what you wanna do with her.”

Like he thought - _hoped_ \- no hesitation. But he thinks he detects the tiniest hint of shyness when Daryl speaks against his jaw. “I wanna watch her suck you off.” A beat of silence, and then, clearly something he had to work for even if only for a second or two: “I love watchin’ her do that to you.”

“Shit, Daryl,” he breathes, and then he's kissing him again, deeper, lifting his free hand away from Beth’s tit to curl it around Daryl’s nape and pull him in harder, and at the edges of his perception, beyond Daryl’s groan and the thrust of his tongue and the sandpaper texture of his scruff, he hears her stunned _ohmigod._

He barely breaks the kiss long enough to grasp her and turn her, Daryl pushing her forward, stumbling her to the mattress and shoving her onto her knees. He hadn't carried the thing down here with the explicit thought of using it for this specific purpose, but the floor is cold and gritty, and even if the idea of giving her some pain isn't at all unappealing, he doesn't want her kneeling there.

He's not _that_ mean.

She goes down with a grunt, her hands already fumbling at his belt and fly. By luck far more than intention he's placed her in the full light of the lantern - though about a third of her side is still in shadow - and he can stare down into her enormous eyes as she slips her little fingers into his open zipper and shorts and grazes him. He twitches, mutters a curse, and he's about to reach for her wrist when Daryl gets there first, his whole body plastered along Rick’s side and his hand over Beth’s as he guides her. His thick hand and her slender one, scarred and smooth, the two of them touching his shaft at once and then together drawing him out, and as he watches this, his own eyes wide and the world suddenly far too bright, he’s circling an arm around Daryl’s waist simply to keep himself on his feet.

Their hands together, stroking up and down his length and giving him a careful squeeze, and then _fuck,_ her moving lower to cup his balls and weigh them in her palm, idly toying with them as Daryl holds his cock around the base, hot breath in his ear, and Daryl grating _Christ, Rick, you feel so fuckin’ good._ This is coming out of _nowhere,_ he didn't expect this at _all_ even in his wilder fantasies, and now he wonders how it's possible that it never occurred to him, watching dreamily as they play with him.

And gaping slack-jawed, kicked out of the dream, when Beth curls her fingers through Daryl’s and gives him a downward tug, a smile dancing across her face and into her eyes.

“Do it with me.”

_Kiss each other._

She keeps doing this to them.

He catches Daryl’s ragged _shit, girl,_ as he drops to his knees beside her, and he really does just about topple onto the mattress with them.

Beth’s shining lips are parted, her tongue sweeping across them as if she's preparing them for him, but instead she frames Daryl’s face and kisses him, soft and open-mouthed with just enough space to allow Rick to see their tongues stroking over each other. She doesn't break the kiss as she reaches up and takes him in her hand again, but then she does pull back, cupping Daryl’s jaw to nudge him forward.

“C’mon.” She looks half shocked, as if _she's_ struggling to believe what she's doing. But the other half is anything but, and appears as if it's having no trouble at all. “It's not complicated. I'll help you.” She presses close, her lips ghosting against his, both inches from the head of Rick’s cock. He stares at them, stares at the clear bead of precome welling at his slit, watches it run over and drip onto the mattress.

Watches as Beth guides his cock and Daryl’s open mouth together, gasps in unison with her as Daryl takes him in.

Gradual. He's hesitant, though not very, and over his own stunned haze of pleasure Rick senses the slightest edge of nervousness. But it's fading, Beth gathering his hair back from his face and holding Rick’s cock in place to make it easier for him, breathing _oh, God, Daryl, that's so good_ and glancing up at him as if seeking to verify.

He nods. He feels like he should do something with his hands but they only hang numbly at his sides as Daryl slides further up, eyes closed and his own hands steadying himself on Rick’s thighs, his cautiousness all but gone, and when he swirls his tongue against the underside of the shaft, Rick’s head falls back and he nearly sobs. 

Beth still close, pink tongue once more flicking out across her lips, and before Rick can process the full reality of what she's doing, she's joining in, swiping that pink tongue up his shaft as Daryl pulls back, running her lips down to the base as Daryl sucks lightly at the head.

He has absolutely no idea how he's still conscious.

Somewhere in the middle of this, a rhythmic series of strained moans rose his chest, and all at once he hears them, the curses embedded in them, his hands at last finding themselves and cupping the backs of both their heads as they lap and lick and suck him. Gliding alongside each other, top and bottom and each taking a side, Beth ducking her head to lave her tongue over his balls while Daryl takes him deep. It's crowded down there and they push against each other, almost jostling, slipping from licking him to licking each other, sloppy kisses around his cock. Careless, messy, their cheeks and chins glistening, and that only makes it so much better. His moans are tightening into whines, fragments of their names; he sounds increasingly helpless, increasingly broken, and he doesn't give a fuck, because they _are_ breaking him, what they're doing to him.

Two slick, eager mouths on his dick at once, and in an absurd flash that brackets off the horror of how it ended, he thinks of all the shit Shane used to give him for not being bolder.

If Shane could see this now.

“Fuck, yeah.” He's winding up, a searing coil in his core. Doesn't think he can stop it. Doesn't want to. “You want this?” Fingers clenching in Beth’s hair and she releases another muffled whimper and licks him like a fucking popsicle. “Come and get it. Gonna give it to you. Shit, you dirty sluts, here it comes…”

He catches a glimpse of them doing more than jostling, actually _fighting_ to be the one to catch it as he shoots the first milky spurt of it, and then his head snaps back and he groans through his teeth as it pulses brilliant through him and stars sparkle at the edges of his vision.

Shaking, he manages to look down in time to see Beth once more framing Daryl’s face, pushing herself up and over him to kiss Rick’s come into his waiting mouth. Passing it from tongue to tongue.

He finally does collapse, barely controlled, and they move to make way for him.

But they don't pull apart. He rolls onto his side and gazes at them, silhouetted and backlit by the lantern, as Daryl pushes her down beneath him, her panting as she shimmies her shorts down her thighs and the clink of his belt, rasp of his zipper, her trembling fingers pulling his cock free. She kicks the shorts away but Daryl doesn't bother with his clothes at all, merely shoves his pants down far enough to give himself room and arranges himself between her spread legs. The light beaming between their mouths like a star as he thrusts into her and they moan a duet.

Like before, Daryl doesn’t start gentle, doesn't build up to it; he fucks her in merciless bucks of his hips, her legs wrapped around his waist. She's reaching for him, for his face, but he seizes her wrists and slams them onto the mattress beside her head, pinning her.

Somehow Rick moves, shifts closer and slides his hand over her. Passes over her tits, her heaving chest, quivering belly, her soaked bush until he reaches the place where they're joined, the slippery shaft of Daryl’s cock as he pounds into her. Her clit; he knows he's touching her just right when she arches and keens, and he smiles against her cheekbone, flicks out his tongue and tastes her salt.

He's weak, dazed, and as before, this is perfect.

It's a tight fit but he makes it work, Daryl shifting his position slightly to give him space, and he lies along her side with his head propped on one hand and rubs her clit as firm and rapid as Daryl’s rhythm. It's nearly overwhelming now that he can focus on it and not on what's going on between his own legs: the jiggle of her tits as her body shakes, the tendons standing out in her neck and her eyes screwed up with what might be pain just as easily as pleasure and in fact is probably a healthy dose of both, her sobs and Daryl’s harsh grunts, the sheen of sweat on his muscles.

This is beautiful, because they are.

“You gonna come?” He traces the shell of her ear with his tongue and she shudders. “Gonna come for us, pretty girl? His big dick feel good in your tight little pussy? This is what you wanted. Isn't it?” He nips her and she squeaks, nods. “Yeah, you take him. You take every damn inch of him.”

He looks up; Daryl’s eyes locked on his, glittering in the shadow of his hair. And suddenly Rick wants to be honest - not that he hasn't been before, but this is different.

“I love watching you,” he whispers, and Daryl goes rigid, wrenches himself backward, braces over her and snarls as he jerks shining ropes of come all over her belly and Rick’s hand. Another few seconds and she's following, crying out and raking her nails mindlessly against the mattress as Rick strokes her climax out of her and Daryl looms over them both, cock still in his fist, panting like a runner.

Dropping to her other side. Rick lets out a ragged breath as Daryl’s fingers join his - touching everywhere but her clit, massaging her, and Rick trails his fingertips through the streaks of come and paints them across her skin.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he breathes, and her mouth stretches into a wobbly smile. Not far from a grin. “You're so good. You're so good for us.”

She doesn't answer except with an exhausted _mmm_ , her eyes fluttering closed. And with a strange, sudden ache, he wishes they didn't have to leave this, that they could all stay here wrapped up in each other, fall asleep this way. It's a mattress really only meant for one and they barely fit on it at all, and there's no blanket, no pillows, but he suspects they could make it work.

They might make it work very well.

For now they can stay, and be reasonably sure that they won't be missed. Maybe even stay for a while; it can't be that long after midnight. They can be greedy. He covers Daryl’s hand with his own - sticky, come drying to a film on his knuckles and he doesn't give a shit about that either - and weaves their fingers together. And there's no stiffening on Daryl’s part, no split second of discomfort. He merely squeezes.

He still doesn't know what this is.

He only knows that he doesn't want to leave it behind.

 


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Daryl out on a hunting trip with Michonne, Rick steals a night alone with Beth - and things continue to get stranger and more complicated. 
> 
> Not necessarily in a bad way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really wanted to go ahead and write something overtly sweet, so I did. Enjoy. ❤️

He watches her for a long time as she walks his daughter up and down the catwalk above, as she sings very quietly, her sweet voice lilting through the air and flooding the mostly-empty block like gentle late-morning sunshine.

As a matter of fact, it is late morning, and the majority of the block’s inhabitants have cleared out for their various daily chores - cooking, sweeping, minor repairs to walls and the roof, laundry duty, the fields and the pigs, the horses and the couple of goats they've found. Earlier he watched Daryl and Michonne ride out on another one of their hunting expeditions, and catching the gleam of chrome and the chestnut highlights in Daryl’s hair as the breeze blew it back, the look he tossed at Rick as he reached the gate and Rick pulled it open for them, there was another one of those odd, bittersweet twinges passing between them, an invisible tether from eye to eye, transient as a length of spidersilk.

He's never been exactly eager to see any of them go, and that includes Daryl - probably more than most if he's honest. But he gazed after them, that the dust cloud thrown up by the bike before they reach the cool green depths of where the road bent into the trees, and he found himself offering up a prayer to whatever might be listening. _Please let them come back safe._

_Please let him._

Not favoritism. It would rip him to pieces if either of them didn't return. This is something else.

A couple of days since they've done anything together. Yet it feels like they're constantly doing everything, every time any of the three of them are within a yard of each other.

He's not within a yard of Beth now. He's standing at the bottom of the stairs up to the catwalk, leaning one-armed on the railing and merely tracking her body and voice with his eyes and his ears. As usual when he sees her, the banked-down coals of his lust are flaring in him, his cock stiffening slightly as he thinks about a scenario in which it's just the two of them and he can bend her over the railing up there and yank her jeans down and drop to his knees to bury his face in the crack of her ass and his tongue in her pussy - but it's only slight. It's an idle fantasy, and it's largely background.

What he's really doing is listening to her.

He's always enjoyed her singing. But lately he's listening to it in a way he doesn't recall doing before. And what she's singing, so low, something he doesn't know and has never heard from her or anywhere else.

> _Do you remember the night we met?_  
>  _That's the night I knew you were my pet_  
>  _I want to tell you_  
>  _How much I love you_  
>  _I'm drowning in a sea of love_

Sunlight touching her hair, her skin - nothing direct but instead a diffuse glow, and he thinks of lying in a meadow at the wonderfully confusing age of sixteen, smoking the joint Shane talked him into - one time and never again because he didn't like the muzzy way it made him feel - and staring up at the tall golden meadow grass swaying over his head. The sun seemed to fall into it in slow motion, and gather it up to carry its loose seed into itself. Looking back now and inserting the fantasy long after the fact: if only he wasn't with his best friend, then. If instead he was with her, if he could roll her under him, kiss her until she was flushed and gasping and tilting her hips up to meet his.

He doesn't remember climbing the stairs, but here she is in front of him, looking up with her eyes wide and so blue, Judith’s downy head resting against her shoulder and one tiny baby-hand curled in the hollow at the base of her threat. Her pretty lips are parted, shining and wet. He can see the barest curve of one breast just below the scoop neckline of her tank top, and he allows his attention to linger there, unabashed. He can do that. He's claimed her as his to look at whenever and however he wants to.

Even though, if she made it clear that she wanted him to stop, he’s now certain that he would without a second’s hesitation, and it wouldn't be a difficult thing to do.

Regardless of how much it would hurt.

“Hi, Rick,” she whispers. Maybe so as not to wake Judith. Maybe for some other reason. Or maybe for both reasons at once.

Doesn't matter. Her precise motivations can remain a mystery to him. He doesn't have to know them in order to stand here with her, his gaze flicking from his daughter to her, and while there's still something deliciously perverse about that juxtaposition… somehow it also feels so natural.

So right.

Quick glance around to make sure they're not within anyone’s line of sight - though that could change any second, and this is dangerous. But he doesn't care. He lifts his hand and glides his fingertips from her cheek down to the corner of her mouth, along the soft curve of her jawline, angling her head slightly upward as he does. She lets out a breathy little sound, her eyes slipping halfway closed, and almost imperceptibly, she presses into his touch.

He wonders if there's any possible way she's fully cognizant of her own beauty.

No, of course she's not. That's part of why she’s so beautiful.

“I love seeing you with her,” he says, nothing more than a murmur inaudible to anyone outside this circle they've made around themselves, and as she releases another, tighter sound, he leans down and brushes his lips against hers. Barely there at all, but he gives her a flick of his tongue as he withdraws, fleetingly playful, and when he pulls back he sees a smile curving her mouth and sparkling in her eyes.

She's also blushing, her skin warm under his fingers. Before this, he wouldn't have believed that an alteration in the pattern of someone’s bloodflow could constitute an invitation, but now he knows better. Even if it's an involuntary one, she's backing it up with every aspect of her body language - the minute parting of her lips and her kitten-tongue sweeping across them, her heavy-lidded gaze, the subtle quickening of her breath. What she's telling him she wants.

What she's offering him.

Abruptly the stiffening of his cock is a lot more than _slight_.

He leans in again, this time his lips brushing her ear, and with a prickle of heated satisfaction he feels the shiver running through her when he breathes the single word. She gave him an invitation; he's for damn sure not going to turn her down.

 _Tonight_.

~

This time it's different. This time he doesn't work himself up to a simmer and force himself to wait. For the rest of the day he leaps at every distraction he can find, puts in a full afternoon out in the field, slops the pigs, washes down their tough bristly hides even if they don’t, strictly speaking, need it. He's been forcing himself to do what must come easily to the Greenes and trying to avoid anthropomorphizing the animals, trying to avoid making them more than they are and forming any attachment to the things they're going to have to kill in a time when killing has both so much more and so much less significance than it did, but he could swear that all of them keep shooting knowing looks at him, and he can't stop himself from glaring at them.

He assists with the cooking, which he hardly ever does - because it usually doesn't go well, and when it doesn't go well it's one of the few things which, for some reason, still breaks through the wall of his chest and grips his heart. Grief is bizarre and utterly irrational, as he's learned so much better than he ever expected, and a reminder of Lori’s hopeless attempts at pancakes and plenty of other meals and how he was never all that much better than she was…

But remembering her right now doesn't hurt as much as it used to. When he might have expected it to hurt so much worse. When he might have expected to feel like he was betraying more than just Hershel and Maggie.

He doesn't ruin the venison stew. Eating it on the steps, listening to the clatter of bowls and silverware as the others chow down, he finds his focus repeatedly straying to the little of Beth’s cell that he can see from where he's sitting. She's not in there, but that doesn't make any difference to his whirling dervish of an imagination; it's enough to look at a place where he'll go, where he’ll _be,_ and in which he plans to do some wonderful things.

Because this won't be in the basement on that ratty bare mattress. It's good enough for her, she’ll take his cock down there with as much enthusiasm as she would take it anywhere, but it's also safe. Relatively.

Daryl’s not here tonight, won't be back until at least tomorrow afternoon. Could be that's making him reckless. Could be it's making him hungry for something a bit more dangerous than even what he did this morning.

He ate her pussy up there, made her writhe as her orgasm raced along her nerves. They didn't get caught then.

So he doesn't lay a hand on himself. Not even much later, everything gone dark and quiet, when he pushes aside her curtain and steps in—silent on bare feet—-and pulls it closed after him, and stares at the bunk and at what's waiting for him.

~

She didn't waste any time. She's prepared to keep him from wasting any time - not that he would have considered it a waste, slowly and roughly stripping her clothes off, or making her strip for him. Nothing of the kind. But in any case, she skipped that step, and she's all spread out, extravagantly naked, her legs wide and her pussy on display for him, glistening shadow in the candlelight. Both hands are between her thighs and her fingers are toying with herself, aimless, giving her clit only absent attention if any at all. She looks almost as if she's exploring herself, as if she's never touched herself before and her own territory is unfamiliar to her. Working over the hood of her clit, creeping around it to her plump, dark lips, tugging and pinching them as her breath catches and she rolls her body off the mattress. One finger nosing between them, barely inside, withdrawing again. Her eyes are closed but they flutter when the curtain rustles, and she gives him a lazy smile as she transfers one hand to her tit and trails a shining circle around her nipple.

He simply stands there and watches her. Doesn't touch himself, though the urge to do so is nearly more than he can bear. He wrestles his features into what he hopes is impassivity and looms over her, and she sighs and plays with herself and seems content to do nothing more than that.

Not that it isn't fucking amazing on its own.

“You slut,” he breathes at last, and there's nothing harsh in it whatsoever. He might be using it as the most affectionate endearment, bending over her to run his hand up her body from her bush to her throat, and she arches and hums, her fingers not missing a beat. “You waiting for me?”

“I'm always waitin’ for you.” She straight-up purrs the words, and when he ducks his head to seal his mouth over hers she's already as open for him as she was when he walked in, her tongue slipping eagerly past his lips and sliding against his. Her hand combs into his hair as she begins to fuck herself with the other; he hears the squelch, catches the rhythmic movements of her wrist and knuckles out of the corner of his eye, but mostly it's her mouth, hot and sweet, wet as he knows her pussy is going to be. He skims his fingertips lightly across her nipples and she squirms and gasps, tightens her grip on him as her legs fall open even wider.

Thing is, he doesn't believe she was merely telling him what he wanted to hear. It's not about ego. It's about her honesty.

“You're so goddamn pretty, girl.” He's shifted his mouth to her ear, and as he speaks he captures the lobe between his teeth and bites, tugs. “Christ, I wanna fuck you for hours. Give it to you till you can't even _move_. Think you'd like that?”

She gulps. Nods. Her fingers withdraw with another sound like wet suction, and when he lifts his head for a second or two, he watches the gleaming strands stretch between them. Saliva floods onto his tongue and it's all he can do to keep from seizing her wrist, yanking her hand up here, sucking those slender fingers clean.

But if he doesn't make her come to him, he can go to her.

She releases a quiet sound of disappointment when he abandons her nipples, but the disappointment twists into growing delight as he proceeds downward, bumping over her ribs and gliding onto the plane of her stomach. A couple quick circles around her belly button and she quivers and stifles a giggle with her hand, and it's so adorable that he can't keep back his grin.

To her bush and even further, raking through the coarse hair with his nails scratching gently over her skin, and she cants her hips up and breathes his name when he reaches her clit - and stops there, unmoving and granting her only the lightest pressure.

“I'm gonna fuck you,” he murmurs, and runs his tongue along the shell of her ear. “Just like you want. ‘cause you're a good girl, ain't you?”

Another gulp, another nod. Every tendon in her neck is standing out beneath her skin.

“Can't do it right away, though.” Mock solemnity, mock concern. Doing what he's come to understand he loves doing and treating her as if she was younger than she is, far less experienced than she is, far less bold. A kind of pretense that edges into play, and he's also edging into a consideration of the possibilities of what else he might do with this. “I gotta make sure you're wet enough first.”

He cups her, heel of his palm against her mound, glancing down to watch what he's doing. One would think, he's dimly aware, that given how familiar he is with her pussy by now, there would be nothing too remarkable about this, no matter how enjoyable. But there is, there so is, and at the second he presses a single finger into her, he draws a sharp breath like he's been hit by a revelation.

It's not some disconnected body part. It's not a hole, regardless of the kind of shit he says when he feels like being especially mean. It's her and he's inside her, pushing deeper and sighing along with her as her slick walls clench around him like she doesn't want to let him go. And he crooks his finger upward and she twitches, jerks her head to the side and groans against the underside of his jaw.

In as far as he can go. Out, in again, and she gropes for his shoulders and bites back a whine.

“That's my girl.” His lips brushing her cheekbone, kissing her in a way that could pass for chaste aside from the rest of what he's doing. “My sweet slutty girl. Shit, honey, I love making you feel good, it's all I want in the damn world…” He trails off, overrun by her breathless moans frantically muffled in the hollow of his throat, and as he adds a second finger and fucks her so slow, he realizes that he doesn't even want to be rough here. From the beginning he's been like that, messed her up and manhandled her and it's been ecstatic, and he can't imagine ever wanting to stop it, but at least for right now he wants to be soft with her, soft as she is, take her with the kind of care and gentleness that's safest in this setting.

Because sure, maybe he wants some danger, but that doesn't remotely mean he wants to get them both caught.

What feels like seconds and then she's fumbling at his wrist, mostly unsuccessful attempts at words shivering out of her. At first he doesn't get it, feels a cold flash of worry that maybe he's hurting her somehow, but those noises don't sound like pain, and when she shoves her hand under his and presses her fingers down on her clit, he feels like an idiot and changes the angle to give her more room - forgets his cluelessness almost immediately when he returns his attention to her face.

He knows how she looks when she's lost in pleasure. The flutter of her eyelids, quick glimpses of white as her eyes roll beneath them, her jaw gone slack and gleaming lips parted, brows drawn together and drawing tighter as her muscle tension briefly returns and her features pull into a grimace. His body is throwing most of her into shadow, but small patches of candlelight find her anyway and soak into her skin, deepening it from cream to the color of honey. As sweet as she truly is, and he pumps his fingers into her and ducks his head to lick at the bud of her nipple.

With his head lowered, she can't muffle her voice against his neck anymore and out of the corner of his eye he catches sight of her biting at the palm of her free hand, moans tying knots in the back of her throat. The light is falling across all of her now and she's gold, skin and hair, shining with sweat like she's been polished. Her wiry muscles standing out beneath that gilded skin as she arches and strains toward what she wants; he thinks about a runner sprinting toward a finish line and lifts himself further over her, completely unable to decide which part of her he should be looking at. He should be looking at all of her. She's fucking incredible, magnificent, and he doesn't see any conceivable way that he’ll ever, _ever_ get enough of this.

He's not even fucking her. He hasn't thought about his own dick in a while. Simply watching her this way seems to be more than sufficient to satisfy him for now.

“C’mon, baby,” he whispers, hoarse and recklessly loud in his own ears. “I wanna see you come. I wanna watch you come all over my fucking fingers, you hear me?” A violent tremble rattles her teeth - only a harbinger, he can tell, but so close - and his breath nearly stutters to a halt. “I want that pussy nice and sloppy when I get my dick in you, bitch. Gotta fuck you twice as good ‘cause he’s not here. Yeah, you- oh, _shit,_ you good _girl_.”

He grins down at her as she snaps her body upward and jams her hand against her mouth, a high, helpless _hnnn_ trapped behind it, every part of her wracked with shudders and the walls of her pussy tensed like a closed fist around his fingers.

“Good girl.” Soft repetition. He's petting her hair, fingers still moving slowly inside her; he might be trying to soothe her more than anything else. “I want you to feel good, sweetheart. I want that so bad.” Another flick of his tongue over her nipple, and she breathes a laugh. “When I fuck you, I'm gonna make it so good for you. I promise.”

He settles back over her, carefully withdraws his hand and traces a glistening trail across her lower belly. She turns her head, snuggles against him, and he feels her lips move against his adam's apple. Feels her smile.

_I know._

Fingers from her belly to her mouth, a husky  _there you go, baby,_ as she sucks them clean. He loses himself in that, just for a few moments—the soft, slightly rough pad of her tongue, the points of her teeth, walls of her cheeks so much like the slippery walls of her cunt. So then he's kissing her again, really taking his time with her, lapping up the taste of her pussy until all he can taste is her.

A disappointed little _oh_ slips out of her when at last he pulls back, but it instantly dies when he pulls his shirt off over his head, gets to his feet and undoes his belt. She's pushed up on her elbows and gazing up at him, pretending wide-eyed innocence so perfectly that he might buy it if he didn't know her so much better than that - and even if he knows it for what it is, that makes no difference. She's not trying to fool him.

She's giving him something else. Playing to him, as he plays with her.

She sucks in a breath when he thumbs down his jeans and shorts together and his dick bobs free, gasps again - sharper - when he kicks them away and steps toward her, curling his hand around his shaft and allowing himself an unhurried stroke.

“God, Rick.” Her legs spread for him, wet sheen on her pubic hair and inner thighs, and his mouth waters; it's so tempting to dive face-first into her and fuck her with his tongue instead of his cock, eat her until she's squirming and trying to yank his damn hair out of his scalp. But if he wasn't thinking much about his dick before, suddenly he’s struggling to think about much of anything else, bending over the foot of the bunk and crawling toward her like a monster crept out from beneath it.

He's still not going to be rough with her. But good Jesus Christ, he is not going to be denied.

Like he said. A smile plucks at the corner of his mouth. He's fucking for two.

“C’mere, honey.” He stops just between her legs and rolls back on his knees, releases his cock and glides his hands up to her hips, lifts and pulls at her. Her brow furrows in confusion, but only for a second or two; then she's scooting forward, ass working up his thighs like she's using a ramp, and without having to be directed she hooks her hands under her knees and folds herself double.

He stares at her. He’s never seen her so open. In all this time, in everything he's done with her, he's never seen her so blatantly and shamelessly _offering_ herself.

“Baby girl,” he breathes, and she smiles, and his hands are shaking as he slicks himself with her swollen lips, finds where he needs to go, and pushes into her.

A whine catches in her chest and she bares her teeth, and he freezes, shaking not only in his hands but everywhere, the wet heat of her thundering through his skull and down his spine. The urge to slam her against the mattress and pound her until the joints of the bunk are squealing is almost overpowering, but he wrestles it back; it's patently absurd, given everything he's done with and to her, but once again he's hit by the anxiety that he's somehow hurt her in a way neither of them want. And this whole _thing_ is absurd, the way it feels like this act is simultaneously both something they've done so many times and something they've never done at all… and yet.

She must be able to see it on his face. In his eyes. She shakes her head, gives him a wobbly version of that lovely smile, lays a hand on his upper arm and squeezes. “I'm alright.” She flexes, tightens around him, and it's his turn to bite back a whine. “I promise.”

He swallows, nods. He believes it. She wouldn't lie. No fucking way would she ever lie just to make him feel better. She's far too tough for that.

Tough enough to take whatever he cares to dish out.

Not now. Not this time. He grasps her by the hips and starts to move.

It's not rapid, and like he planned, it's not rough. But it's firm and it's _deep,_ rocking his hips as he uses his grip on her waist to tug her ass further into his lap, and watching, rapt, as she rolls her head loosely back and her cute little tits quiver with every thrust. She's muffling her sounds again, not with the heel of her palm this time - clutching her leg with one hand to keep herself spread while she sucks at two of her fingers with the kind of whole-souled fervor that just about melts his brain.

Not sucking. She's fucking her own goddamn mouth with them.

“Shit, baby.” He shifts them and resettles between her legs, leans over and runs his fingertips up her delicate wrist to her knuckles, accompanying her movement. Matching her rhythm. Once more it’s as if he's falling into her, deeper and more completely than his cock in her cunt; at some point he tumbled off some precipice that he didn't even know he was teetering on the edge of and now he's plunging, powerless to stop it, slipping a single finger past her lips to join her two.

And with a spike of heat he realizes that something else is meant to occupy the space where her fingers are now. Something else is meant to do that job. She's giving herself what Daryl isn't here to give her. She has a need and she's satisfying it.

But no way in hell is it enough for her.

She's so _wet,_ soft smack of their skin colliding even though he's still not going at her half as hard as he wants to. He braces himself up and adds a second finger, breathing a laugh as her hand drops away and gropes at his shoulder with mounting urgency. Maybe she could come like this, maybe that could happen, and he angles himself down in a way that hopefully gives her more pressure and more friction, pumping his fingers slowly between those luscious, shining lips.

Her gasping through her nose, hot breath on the back of his hand, and the vibration of her moans. Body heaving under his as the muscles of her cunt tense and release and tense. He knew she’s strong. He shouldn't have been surprised to discover that she's strong there too.

Christ, he can't get too lost. Can't get too lost and be too late.

“I know you want him, Beth.” Leaning closer, studying her as best he can with how his head is spinning. Meeting her enormous eyes and soaking in the need he sees there. “Yeah, I know you want him to be here. You want him to feed you his fat dick, don't you? He's gonna. We’re gonna have you for fuckin’ hours when he gets back. We’re gonna fuck your pretty pussy _raw_.”

He knows what the words do to her by now, that they're dragging her up to where she wants to go. He can feel it in the way she's shivering and twitching, reaching for it as hard as she can, and he's not fucking her raw right now but he can do his best to fuck her into her climax, and he will.

Because that's what he wants. Even with his come throbbing in his balls, that's what he wants.

“C’mon, baby.” His lips ghost across her cheek, resting at the corner of her mouth. Something in him is throbbing and it's not merely his balls. “You come for me, sweetheart. I wanna see it. Oh, it's alright if you can't, but I wanna see it, please…”

She is, starting in the core of her - what feels like right at the head of his cock and surging all through her, a tremble that becomes a shudder that becomes a full-body convulsion that makes him clamp his hand over her mouth to block her cry. And she's still shaking when he suddenly wrenches out of her and up to his knees and shoots across her belly, biting his own tongue to silence himself, and the flare of pain only gives it hot spice as the last of his come drips from his fist onto her mound.

His fingers are still in her mouth. Her jaw has gone slack, her head lolled to the side and her eyelids low, the candlight toying with the shadows on her face.

 _Beautiful_.

His lips form the word, voiceless. He leans down again and lifts his hand to outline her own lips with come-slick fingers, and she wearily licks at them, humming. Happy. This always seems to make her happy.

 _He_ makes her happy.

He's mulling this notion over, dazed, as he lowers himself down beside her and gathers her close against his chest, come sticky between them. He doesn't care. He likes it. There are all kinds of ways in which he’s marked her, claimed her, and this feels like one of them.

She murmurs something he can't make out, and he ducks his head, making an inquiring sound.

“Stay.” She tilts her head back enough to look at him, a weak smile dancing around her mouth and dancing far less weakly in her eyes. “Just for a while? Just till I fall asleep?”

 _Oh, baby girl_. He lays a lingering kiss against her temple, her brow, and then, in a fit of slightly goofy inspiration, her nose. He flicks his tongue at its tip and she giggles, nuzzles him and nips at his collarbone.

This is not what it started as. This is not how they began.

Except maybe it is. Maybe it exactly is.

“Yeah,” he whispers, and weaves his fingers into her damp hair. He will. Until she falls asleep, and he thinks about leaving even after that and part of him recoils. On the bare mattress in that basement room, so close to her and thinking about what it would be like if all three of them stayed, ridiculously cramped though it would have been. If they never had to go their separate ways in the end.

If they didn't have to hide. As delightful as sneaking around is turning out to be.

She sighs and hooks a leg over his, and he continues to comb the tangles out of her hair, his nose full of the smell of soap and their mingled sweat and their fucking, his dick going soft between them and his come beginning to itch on his skin - that last easy to ignore, like this. There's so much else to capture and hold his imagination. The way he captures and holds her.

Though, wasn't it the other way around? He thinks maybe it was.

“He's gonna come back, sweetheart.” Barely a breath, and he's not positive she's even awake to hear it - but she sighs again and somehow relaxes even further, and she likely is and did. And he doubts she’s too worried, and neither is he…

But it's different now.

“He's gonna come back,” he repeats. Certain. “He's gonna come back tomorrow, Beth, and we’re gonna treat you so right.”

_I promise._

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song is "Sea of Love" by Tom Waits.


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Musing on the increasingly strange turn their lives have taken, Rick and Beth wait for Daryl to return. And wait. And wait. And wait. And then he does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like I said on Tumblr, I apologize in advance. 
> 
> ❤️

But he doesn't come back tomorrow.

Not worrying in and of itself. Rick said it, and said it like it was a certainty, but that was soft talk, Beth understands, lazy after-sex talk, _pillow_ talk, and not necessarily to be taken in a literal sense. And there was some wishful thinking in the mix, she'd guess. She wanted - wants - Daryl to come back as soon as humanly possible, and Rick wasn't just agreeing for her benefit. He did - and does - want Daryl back too. Badly.

Something bigger there, thrumming beneath the surface like the vibrations of a distant but rapidly approaching train. She's not troubled by it. She feels no hint of jealousy - that's never been part of this, which is so strange but somehow also not in the least surprising. She thinks about it, about how she’s seen Rick look at him when Daryl’s pinning her down and fucking the _bones_ out of her, and her breath tightens with the muscles of her thighs.

And with something else, warm and dense resting just above her diaphragm.

When they're fucking is not the only time she's caught Rick looking at Daryl that way.

He and she want him back, _tomorrow._ But he and Michonne don’t come. They almost certainly wouldn't return before noon unless they had to cut the run severely short for some reason, but hot afternoon hours roll by like sweat rolling down her cheek from her hairline, making her itchy and restless - because the hours are absent him.

In the last flush of late afternoon, she sits in a patch of shade on the steps facing the yard and the gate beyond, watching with Judith cradled against her chest, tiny plump baby hands groping at the bottle she's tipping downward and enormous blue eyes gazing up at her. She glances down; they're fathomless, those eyes, and knowing. She's wondered more than once if babies are born knowing everything, and only as they grow up does the world force them to forget.

So maybe Judith is studying her and sensing her disquiet as clearly as if Beth was explaining it aloud, and understanding it just as well.

“It’s nothin’,” she murmurs, unaccountably embarrassed. Stupid, embarrassed about this in front of a baby. Why should she be embarrassed, anyway? She just misses him. She wants him to come back.

And it's not only about what he can do to her.

She _is_ thinking about his hands, returning her attention once more to the gate and the swaying treetops, the few scattered walkers doggedly staggering again and again into the outer fence. Not his hands on her tits, delightfully rough, or his thick fingers curling into her pussy. That's so nice, and yes, she likes his essential roughness so very much, but she's thinking about the simple fact of his hands on her skin, their gentleness only magnified by how rough he is, stroking up her arms and her shoulders, raising pleasant goosebumps across the back of her neck. Tracing the line of her jaw, fingertips against the seam of her lips. Combing through her hair. His blunt nails, ragged at the edges from his habitual gnawing, and the fine speckle of white scars on his knuckles. The tiny dark star above the webbing between his right forefinger and thumb.

When he comes back, she wants to touch that star. She wants to kiss those little white scars and flick at the ink with her tongue. Ask him about it, maybe. Ask him about all of them. Maybe even the biggest and worst ones, which she senses make him uncomfortable.

Outline each inked line with her fingers and her mouth, until he's twitching and gasping under her.

Maybe she wouldn't have to do it alone.

Okay, so it wasn't about fucking to start with, but of course it swung around to that eventually, and she's washed through by a shiver of mingled arousal and amusement when a touch on her shoulder makes her jump slightly.

But she doesn't have to turn to instantly know who it is. So she doesn't.

Rick leans on the railing beside her, and she can feel his gaze aligning with hers. Same exact focus; probably very near to the same exact thing running through his mind. She’s keenly aware that when Rick Grimes thinks about _wanting_ these days, fucking is strung like Christmas lights all across the surface of his mind. But it's not the core. It never has been. She’s seen him at his best and at his worst by now, and one of the first things she saw when she first saw him at all is how damn much he cares. Sitting there by the bed in her house, watching his little boy struggling to take his next breath, and a gauzy curtain of low light falling over him merely threw his wreckage into sharper relief. Later, with Lori gone like she was, even worse.

You lose your mind like he has only when you can love someone with your very marrow.

Suddenly, vaguely, she's afraid for him, and she doesn't like that at all.

She reaches up for him at the precise instant he reaches down, and their hands meet in an awkward tangle of fingers. There's no one in immediate proximity, but even if there was, she doesn't care - in this moment - who sees it. They could make of it whatever they wanted to and it would be nothing to do with either of them.

“Said they might be back the day after. Probably, even,” he murmurs, and in the perphery of her vision she sees him shift his eyes down to her before he returns them to the gate. “Today was pretty optimistic.”

“Yeah.” She says it in a heavy sigh - resigned. He's right. Holding anyone to too strict a timetable these days is a recipe for emotional disaster. Daryl will be here when he can, when he is. Until then she needs to be patient. Trust him and Michonne to do what needs doing.

But.

“It's all different now,” she says softly. She's not looking at him, but she can feel his eyes snap back to her, their pressure and their heat - not the now familiar and decidedly welcome heat of his lust, or not that alone. Heat of sheer intensity, of that core in him which is capable of driving him mad when damaged too badly.

She hasn't hurt him, saying that. But she's shaken him. Because it's the closest she's come to naming whatever this is, not a fun little diversion and a dirty little secret but something so big and so deep that it might alter the world, and every bit of that is implicit in what she's _not_ saying, those four words merely the visible part of the massive iceberg below.

In her arms, Judith squirms and bats at the bottle, and Beth disentangles her hand from Rick’s, raises the angle and mutters an apology. She got distracted, let it almost level out.

Rick still isn't speaking. Still staring at her.

Until, after a couple of moments from which all the air seems to drain: “Yeah. Yeah, it is different.”

That's all she gets out of him, then. But it's frankly more than she expected.

~

Later, she goes to him.

As she's learned to do by now, it's some time after the last wakeful sounds have died away and the block is still except for snores and muffled sleep-grunts. Padding barefoot across the cool concrete to his cell and lifting the curtain aside without even considering a request for permission. Moonlight is streaming through the high windows and immediately it drenches the space, sharpening the outlines of the shadows, milk and ink. Either he was already awake or he merely woke up with the same feline speed and completeness they all had to develop out there on the road, but regardless which, he's pushing himself up on one elbow, his bare chest and arms pale as bone. His eyes glitter as he blinks at her. His face is half bathed in those inky shadows, but she doesn't miss his confusion.

“Beth?” he whispers.

Her gaze flicks to the crib set against the opposite wall, and back to him. Judith with him tonight instead of Carl; not a problem. She's not concerned about waking her.

That's not what she came for.

Wordless, she crosses the few feet to him, letting the curtain fall closed behind her and both softening and spreading the darkness. He hasn't moved, but he does shift back slightly when she sinks down on the bed, her head low and her hands between her knees.

“Y’alright?”

She still doesn't answer. Instead she turns and lifts her legs up onto the mattress, reclines, nestles close to him with a heavy sigh. For a second or two he hesitates - then opens to her and curls an arm around her, doing the same with his entire body. He feels big and so warm, and she tucks her head under his chin, her lips against the ridge of his collarbone, her palm fitted over his hip.

Both arms around her now. Holding her, in the most proper sense of the word. She smiles faintly and kisses the base of his throat.

He pulls her closer and murmurs something she can't make out. He's hard, of course; had to be practically as soon as she walked in wearing only her shorts and her thin chemise, if not before, and his cock is nudging her belly through the fold of his own shorts, the head slick against her skin as her top rides up. But not with any particular insistence, and she can tell implicitly that at present he doesn't want that any more than she does. Or he does, he wants her every damn minute of every damn day, but this isn't the right time, and that’s okay.

She simply wants this. She wants what she has now. Him wrapped around her, enclosing her, and her able to be small and reassured by that strong, rhythmically beating circle.

As far as circles go, it's not closed. It's not whole. Not quite.

But it will be.

~

Except it's not.

Still. All through the morning, the hour or two of pre-dawn dark bleeding into gray twilight, snuck back to her own cell and lying on her back, staring blankly at nothing. Mind spinning into a whirlwind that scoops up the contents of her head and tosses them every which way, making a mess of her thought patterns. No pattern at all. With Rick, she could sleep, but no way is she getting any more of that on her own, a mattress barely big enough for one good-sized man seeming vast and dimly ominous.

She slings her arm over her brow and settles her attention low in her ribcage, feeling the rise and fall until she manages to be lulled.

But she still doesn't sleep.

She's primed for the worst. She couldn't be anything else. Since her one nearly lethal storm of pessimism - _nihilism,_ really - she's never considered herself anything but an optimist. But that doesn't mean she hasn't been conditioned. It doesn't mean she's strong enough to fight the grinding force of what's all around her every day.

She can imagine the worst far better than she should be able to, because she's seen the worst over and over again.

That's why she should disregard it, she thinks with a rush of tight stubbornness, standing under the lukewarm shower spray with her hair dripping in her eyes. It's not based on anything she knows _right now._ She’s afraid of the worst and that's why it's haunting her. Nothing more to it than that. She sure as hell didn't suddenly develop clairvoyance of any kind.

_Relax._

She dresses. Helps Carol in the kitchen. Helps Maggie and Glenn weed the garden. Feeds Judith. She does these things on autopilot and on some level she's worried everyone can sense her distance. She's not certain how she would answer, if they asked her if something was wrong, other than _nothin’._

Which there's no possible way they would buy.

But they don't appear to notice. Either way they leave her alone. And in the early afternoon, when she retreats to her cell for what's supposed to be a nap, she's able to get herself off with her fingers pumping furiously in and out of her pussy and her legs spread wide and the image of all three of them arranged in a moaning daisy chain churning through her mind. Daryl’s cock stuffing her mouth, Rick’s cock stuffing Daryl’s, Rick’s hungry tongue giving her exactly what she needs.

When Daryl and Michonne get back, maybe they can all sneak away and give that a try. That's what she's thinking as she sucks her sticky fingers clean, all that same stubbornness running under it like a deep river current.

_When._ That's what she knows.

~

After dinner. They're not back.

She's aware that it's much too soon to panic. Doesn't make any difference; she can feel it threatening on her interior horizon, dark and looming as a thunderhead. Something is wrong. Pacing up and down the block and using a fussy Judith as her cover for doing so, casting glance after glance at the entrance to the block and hoping desperately that she doesn't look as twitchy as she feels.

Catching Rick’s eye as he walks past. For a moment or two she's sure he’ll just keep walking, but he turns around, eyes hooded in the low light, and returns to her, and when he takes Judith carefully from her, his hand brushes hers and lingers much longer than it needs to.

Soothing her. But he's worried too. He's radiating it like heat.

Much later she's with him again, legs and hands tangled, and this time after a few minutes lying like that he does tug her shorts down, flip her over onto her stomach, finger her just enough to get her wet, grip her by the hips and raise her ass so it's easier to bury himself balls-deep inside her. Fucking her in long, smooth slides, and doing it with a gentleness she's only felt hints of before.

It shouldn't feel gentle. He didn't ask her permission, literally or otherwise. He wanted her and he took her, barely any preamble, and it should feel as if he's simply using her.

It does. But it doesn't. She's trembling beneath him and fruitlessly humping the mattress, groping for his hand where it's braced beside her head, and he weaves their fingers together, kissing the nape of her neck between his ragged breaths.

Abruptly stiffening, pulling suddenly out of her and spurting hot over the small of her back and the curve of her ass - and then just staying there for a moment, both of them gasping, until he lowers himself to lie next to her and uses his wonderfully nimble fingers on her, coaxing her climax out of her with relentless patience.

_Oh, Beth,_ he's whispering. She's almost positive. _My pretty little slut. My sweet girl._

She falls asleep in his arms, still streaked with his come, licking the brackish taste of his sweat from her lips.

~

Not the next morning. Not early. Not later. The sun climbs upward and she stands in the yard, her bare shoulders and arms prickling goosebumps even though the day is already warm, and tries not to look at it. The hue seems off, too white and too hard. She feels as if she's coming apart, her seams stretching and breaking, and she doesn't know how to hold herself together, and the persistent feeling that she's overreacting isn't helping whatsoever.

Sooner or later, someone really is going to notice that something’s up, and they won't be able to ignore it anymore even if they would vastly prefer to do so.

She chews fiercely on her thumbnail. Her other hand is clenching and unclenching into a fist, as if she's itching to hit something. _Christ, just please come home. Come home so I can stop feeling like this._

_Please._

They don't. He doesn't.

Afternoon. Evening. She's beside herself, walking around like she's not about to rip off her own damn skin. Trying desperately to keep from lunging at Rick and gripping him by the shirt and _shaking him_ as if he had some ability to affect any of this. As if he isn't quietly freaking out too. And watching him from across the block as he discusses something with her father, tone pitched down and his expression all seriousness, she's certain that he's dealing with the same mental bullshit she is, the same repetitive objections: that it's only three days, that shit happens and a significant percentage of the time that shit is an annoyance rather than a catastrophe. They might be delayed for any number of reasons that amount to nothing more than inconveniences.

Yeah. Sure.

She doesn't go to him this time. For some reason merely lying next to him like that feels beyond what she's capable of. Just a reminder of what's missing, and it's not like she needs help where that's concerned. Feels like she's being an asshole, but oh well.

Rick is a big boy. He can handle it.

Her own pragmatic bluntness surprises her somewhat. It's not as if it wasn't there before, but it was not this pragmatic or this blunt.

She's not turned on at all, her mind isn't anywhere near it; nevertheless she surfaces from a low doze to discover her hand between her thighs and her fingers circling her clit, and all at once she's close, arching and reaching for it with a whine squeezing between her gritted teeth, and it might be exactly what she needs-

Startled cries. Distant but approaching fast. Running feet, and alarm that transcends what she can hear and hangs thick in the air like a bad smell. The block is stirring, murmuring, the dull glow of lanterns being lit, and she practically launches herself up from her bunk, arousal evaporating, her bare feet thumping the concrete as she runs out onto the catwalk and toward the stairs.

Rolling through her like breaking waves: _Here it is. Here it is._

She's at the foot of the stairs when they come in. Not quite at a run; they can't, not with what they're carrying, but they're as close to it as they can get. She stands there and stares at them and at it, all the blood draining from her legs as if the floor itself is sucking her dry. Michonne there with her features twisted into something Beth barely recognizes, and Glenn and Carol, and Rick in the front, his face as bloodless as she feels, shouting _Someone get Doctor S._

_Right fucking NOW._

Held between them on a rough stretcher thrown together with scrap boards from the yard: rumpled clothes and a rumpled form that looks vaguely human - blood glistening black in the light of the lanterns.

A lot of blood.

Closer. They seem to be moving nightmarishly slowly and terrifyingly fast, and she stumbles back against the railing, her chest hitching with the breath she can't draw. Somewhere, Judith is squalling. Through the whirling, jagged incoherence that her mind has become, she's thinking _Daddy lived, Daddy lived and he's alright, if they just cut it off whatever it is if they just cut it off he’ll be alright too._

A couple cycles of that. Then it shatters into silence as she sees him clearly - a snapshot bizarrely sharp in the midst of the blur that everything else has melted into. His entire body limp and his head lolling, and his face through the lank mess of his hair, not merely pale but _bleached._ His shirt in shreds, and shockingly dark on that white skin, dark even under the blood smeared all over it…

The long, cruel scratches slashed across his belly.

She doesn't remember the point at which she hits the floor. She simply knows, once she's down, that the floor is where she's lying.

That she has no idea how she’ll get up again.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Be cool, my babies.


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daryl has returned, and not in a manner Rick or Beth ever would have wished. But things like that have a way of throwing certain truths into sharp relief. Rick is beginning to think he can't avoid them. And Beth knows she doesn't want to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The rare porn-free chapter. Fuck all this character/relationship development, this is not what I wanted when I started this thing. :|
> 
> As usual, I'm wretched at responding to comments. As usual, please know that they're great and they make me so happy and thank you. ❤️

He hasn't been so consciously worried about what people might think of him and Daryl, if they knew. On some level, he supposes, he's been assuming that no one would much care. But it's been so wrapped up in what they’ve both been doing with Beth, and that's made the secrecy surrounding it a good bit more robust. Something to maintain, big deal or no big deal. And - because he hasn't asked, and maybe he should - he doesn't know what Daryl feels. So he's been keeping it to himself. No reason to let on and every reason to be discreet.

Except as soon as Rick sees him practically tumbling off the horse, Michonne barely arresting his fall and outstretched arms barely there in time to catch him, as soon as he sees all the blood glistening in the uneven light of the lanterns as people hold them high, he stops giving even an iota of a shit about it.

What they might see. What conclusions they might draw from it.

He blinks and then there's a roar of speed and exertion and he's gone from the doorway to Daryl’s side, scrambling to help them assemble planks to make the stretcher. Trying not to look at the gore and unable to stop himself, whatever other task he's trying so desperately to lose himself in, because if he doesn't have something to do he genuinely thinks he might collapse by Daryl’s prone form, shove people out of the way, and…

He doesn't know. Something. Something he wouldn't be able to control.

Voices. A senseless jumble of them; he's straining to make out any information, any hint as to what did this, because he saw enough to know that if it's a walker there's nothing whatsoever to do except make sure it's as quick and painless as possible, but then they're lifting Daryl up and he's somehow at the front, keeping his legs under him by sheer force of will, feeling like he's slogging through the mud of the jittery chaos around him. The voices, the light, the muggy night and the groan of walkers in the distance. Warring with himself to keep back the thought that he's carrying a condemned man.

Pretty much dead already.

If that happens. He can't even consider that. If the last time he touched this man in pleasure was the last time he would ever touch him that way. If the last time he saw him with Beth, taking her and so beautiful.

If the last time they were so close was the end. And he should have been savoring every second of it, and he didn't, because he didn't know. Because he got greedy, and he thought there would be more time.

If he spirals down into that, he'll never come up. Into the block, and he hears himself bellowing for the doctor, and that's when he sees Beth standing by the stairs with her face stricken and white, as if she's been drained of blood as well.

And he sees her go down, and as with Daryl, he's not there in time to catch her.

~

He hangs back long enough to see.

Not in the way. It takes just about everything he has left to not get in the way, to not crowd in and stare uselessly down at the mess of Daryl Dixon’s body, give in and lose himself after all in the morass of noise and light and voices and the shifting shadows of busy hands. Dr. S is good. He’ll do his job. Hershel is there, and he’ll do what he can as well. And then slapping his hand against the concrete wall when he realizes what he's been thinking, assuming that _Dr. S’s_ _job_ won't consist simply of jamming a knife into Daryl’s temple. Putting a bullet through his skull.

Beth. He has to get back to Beth if he can't do anything else here. But all at once it's very hard to see.

“It wasn't.”

He jerks his head up, blinks hard. Michonne, shoulders slumped and half-cloaked in shadow. Bloody and clearly exhausted, one side of her shirt ripped from neckline to ribs. Yet naturally she's on her feet. She couldn't be anywhere else.

And she said something. He doesn't understand. Raises a hand to scrub at his face, as if he's been sleeping too deep and woke up all wrong. “What?”

“You think it was a walker.” She takes a slow breath, and it shakes at the end. If she does go down, he decides, if that happens, he is finally going to be there in time for someone, and put himself between her and the floor. “It wasn't.”

Then he can't think at all.

“What?”

Again, through numb lips. The shouting has abated, and Glenn and Carol are shooing away the crowd of gawkers gathering around the cell they've set up as a makeshift infirmary. It's background. Those two words are all that matters.

“Cougar.” She takes another breath, and she sounds steadier, though her stance is still wavering. Nearly imperceptible but he knows her. He sees it. “We hit a block in the road, had to go around. There was an outcrop. We never saw it coming.” Her mouth pulls into a ghost of a rueful smile. “The damn bike is still out there.”

She's wavering. He's imploding. It's only after he feels her hands on his shoulders that he realizes she's the one who's caught him, and his gratitude almost manages to overwhelm his violent flush of embarrassment.

And she might wonder. He's dimly aware of this possibility. They all care about each other, _love_ each other, but she still might see, and she's just about as perceptive as Daryl is, and she might really _see_.

Well. Too late to do anything about that. He meets her eyes, looks away. Searches the dimness near the stairs for Beth and doesn't see her. Someone else must have gotten to her. Maggie, perhaps.

Perhaps that's better. Better than him.

Later he'll be distantly proud that even through the thundering, confused relief in his head, he's got a sufficient amount of his shit together to consider the other unpleasant possibilities here. Cougars don't just attack people, not as a rule. So it was desperately hungry, or-

“Rabid?”

“I don't know.” Michonne shakes her head, full lips twisting. “I don't think so. Anyway, it only scratched him.”

 _Only scratched._ He wrestles back a peal of hysterical laughter. She might take it the wrong way. “Looks like it pretty much gutted him.”

“It tried. I took it out.”

“Of course you did.” His hand on her powerful arm, squeezing. He's got his feet under him again. They might not be all that solid, but they're there, and that's something for him to hold onto besides her. Not that she isn't enough. It wouldn't be the first time. “Thanks. Thank you.”

But she looks at him for a long moment, then - longer than he really feels she would have a reason to, and her eyes are narrow, keen, studying him through her weariness. He looks back, less settled every second, and every one of those seconds more certain.

She knows. Or she knows some of it. She knows _something_ is going on.

She and Daryl were out there for days. A fuck of a lot obviously happened during that time. What did he say? In those moments of extremity, perhaps not fully lucid and in command of his own words, what did he say?

Is this going to be a problem?

Finally she ducks her chin in the tiniest of nods, gives his shoulder one more answering squeeze. “Y’alright?”

He nods back. So far as it goes, he’ll grant, he is. Glancing past her at the brightly lit cell—or as brightly lit as they can make it—and Dr. S and Hershel leaning over a body he can no longer clearly make out. The glisten of blood and the glitter-flash of stainless steel. When it comes to things like this, at times like now, he has no idea how to discern the lethality of a wound. All he can be sure of is that it's bad.

“They're working on it,” she says softly. “They'll take care of him.”

And that's when he's positive: Yes, she knows. Or at least she knows this side of it; Beth might be a different matter altogether. _They’ll take care of him_ is the kind of thing she could say to any of them about any other - except it's not. Not in the way she's saying it, and not in the way she's touching him now.

So gentle.

“Alright.” He steps back, not quite shaking her off. He's not fleeing, not exactly, but he's closer to it that he would like. He can't stay here any longer, not with how she's looking at him and with how many half-crazed words are still crowding into his throat, fighting to get out and none of them advisable. He needs to get his head together. He gestures vaguely at the air behind him. “I gotta.”

“Yeah.” She's stepping back too - letting him go. Not that she was making him stay, but even so. And she's got herself to take care of; scanning her, he's freshly aware of the blood streaking her hands and front, more blood on the grip of the sword at her back. Her trembling edges. “Me too.”

He leaves her and heads off deeper into the block, pushing past a few people whose identities he doesn't register and walking nowhere in particular.

It's when he reaches the thicker shadows under the windows, beneath the reach of the moonlight and whatever other paltry lights the rest of them carry, that he can spare the brain to think about it: about how gentle she might be if she really knew all of it.

If she knew what he and Daryl have been doing to Hershel’s youngest daughter.

Pretty little Beth, taking it from both ends, on her hands and knees and stuffed full of cock until tears are streaming down her cheeks and spit is dripping from her chin. Used good and hard by two men old enough to be her father, fucked to within an inch of her life and left a sprawled, sweaty, heaving mess.

Usually thinking about her like that would have his dick straining to bust free. Now he half falls against the wall and swipes his hands down his face, pressing his fingertips against his eyelids as a faint wave of nausea washes through him.

This is not sustainable. It never was.

~

She remembers the sickeningly whirling lights, the cries. She remembers the world tilting and her feet vanishing out from under her, her hands scrabbling against the railing and her tailbone and hip cracking in a blast of white pain against the floor. Then not a lot else, until Maggie was sitting her up and combing her hair back from her face, tipping her head up with fingers under her jaw, searching her. She was trying to brush Maggie off. She was fine. Goddammit, she was _fine,_ but Daryl wasn’t and she had to get to him, she had to see, because what if he didn't have…

What if he didn't have much time.

She has no idea if she was able to relay any of that. She has no idea if succeeding would have been a good thing. What she knows is that then everything blurred away again, and the next thing she knew she was being helped carefully up the stairs, down to her cell, the ruckus dying away below her as strong, firm hands pressed her down onto her bunk.

She didn't hit her head. But God, it sure feels like she did.

No more Maggie. But a form standing in the doorway of her cell, sillouetted against the weird light outside, and the distinct feeling of being watched. Not unpleasant. She knows this form, and she knows that gaze. He's come to her before. He's come to her, here, and it's been wonderful.

Not like this, now. He's not just _coming in_ the way he did. He's hanging back, uncertain. Maybe waiting to be asked inside.

She levers herself up on one hand, wincing at the flare of pain in her ass, and beckons.

He's walking slowly, a bit hunched. Looks as tired as she is, she thinks with amusement so thin it's skeletal. Her hand is still outstretched, and when he reaches her he takes it and stares down at her in silence, his features bare outlines in the dimness.

And that's when the full force of reality hits her all over again: that she just saw Daryl carried in bleeding, looking half dead, and that might mean his death is essentially complete. That Rick might have come up to tell her precisely that. That he might have come up to tell her that she should go down to him now if she wants to say goodbye.

That she's too late and he's already gone.

Her heart crams itself into her throat and she literally chokes, hiccups, and though suddenly she can't feel her extremities she must clutch spasmodically at him, because his face abruptly twists and he sinks down beside her, still holding her hand.

 _Tell me,_ she's shrieking inside. Winding up to do a lot more than confine her shrieking to inside. With profound alarm she realizes that she's ready to claw at him, give him some scratches of his own. _Tell me he's dying, tell me he's dead, just fucking do it, just TELL ME._

“It wasn't,” he's saying, taking her other hand in his and clasping them together. His grip is so warm. “It wasn't a walker. He's not gonna turn.”

She gapes at him. Replays it, over and over. Mentally parses the words as if she's probing for flaws, or for any hint of dishonesty. Only he wouldn't. She knows that. It doesn't matter how he talks to her when he's fucking her, when he's _playing_ with her: he doesn't believe she's a child. He won't treat her like one.

He won't lie to her just to spare her feelings. It wouldn't only be stupid. It would be denying a reality she's already nearly drowned in the darkest parts of.

If he says it wasn't a walker, it wasn't a walker.

“So what-”

“Cougar. Michonne says.” He glances down at their joined hands. “Your dad and the doc are seeing to him.”

“Oh.” In a breath, a hard puff of air, and then she's pushing up on her knees and wrapping her arms around him, her head spinning. Not thinking about it; it doesn't feel like the kind of thing she needs to consider. The curtain is still pulled partway back, and screw that. Screw who sees this. Everything is flooding out of her, though her eyes are strangely dry. All that fear, pouring through her skin.

Not the fear of the last hour or so. Fear accumulated through hours and days, generated by sheer absence.

He lifts his arms and curls them around her middle, his broad palms settled over her shoulderblades. Like this, she's slightly taller than him, and his brow is resting against the slope of her shoulder, his breath as warm as his hands on her bare skin.

He's flooding out just like she is. He was every bit as scared as her.

_Every damn bit._

Gradually, she slides down and onto her back, taking him with her until he's lying beside her with his head on her chest, his muscles beginning to loosen. Both of them, so frightened over the idea that they might lose this man. Frightened so badly for such a long time before they were willing to admit it, and by the time they finally did, it might have been too late.

She's not going to risk that again. She's not going to make herself too stupid to see what's right in front of her. When this began, she told herself it was about having some delightfully filthy and delightfully secret fun, and it was, and it is, though she's no longer so confident about the _secret_ part. But it's also not that simple. Not anymore. It can't be, not after this.

Anything that makes her feel this way can't possibly be even remotely simple.

She gazes up at the darkness gathered between her and the ceiling. The cell feels so much bigger at night, every shape ludicrously outsized and looming. The echo of the concrete, even with all the little relics of an old world that she's accumulated to make it into a home. It feels, not uncomfortably, like a cave.

Something old in that. Something primal. A cave and the dark, and a man, and a woman. And downstairs, so hurt, the man they both…

“I love him,” she breathes, and he sighs, and it's really not that difficult.

Except of course she doesn't stop there.

“I love you, too.”

This time he doesn't sigh at all.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although clearly Rick and Michonne aren't together in this universe, it was really important to me to confirm how much affection and mutual respect is between them. So I hope I've done that, even in a relatively short scene.


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Practically gutted by a cougar, Daryl is expecting a very final ending. But it's not. In fact, it might be a whole new kind of beginning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I PROMISE WE'RE NOT DONE WITH THE PORN. Promise. I don't think this is wrapping itself up quite yet. I'm not sure how much longer it'll continue, but it doesn't feel to me as if the ending is imminent. 
> 
> Hope not, anyway. 
> 
> As usual, thanks so much for being here and reading and commenting and basically everything. ❤️ It's a confidence-booster and I frankly need those.

“Jesus Christ, hold _still_.”

Vague annoyance flickers through him. Why? What's to hold still for? He's either dead or he's right on the raggedy edge of being so; he saw those claws flash wickedly sharp in the sun and he saw them raking across his midsection, and he felt thin pain like a high-pitched whine in the center of his head and then the warm, watery sensation in his stomach that signals far too much blood flowing far too quickly.

Dead or almost dead: these are the two binary possibilities. Likewise, he's either merely bleeding out, or his guts are spilled in a slippery coiled tangle from where his belly is ripped open. So why in the name of the guy Michonne is swearing by does it matter whether or not he moves?

Surely she's not stupid enough to be trying to _save_ him.

Something pressed against the place where the pain has drilled into him. He can still feel it, he's still alive enough for that, and he releases a pitiful yelp - way more sound than he should be capable of - and gropes weakly at her. Blinks. His back is against something cool and rough and hard, scraping his shoulders as he disobeys her, and from where he's slumped he sees her only as a thick dark form blotting out the sun, a few rays flickering around her head like a corona around the black circle of an eclipse.

She's holding something against his middle. He glances down, manages to focus for the briefest of moments; torn strips of his own shirt already soaked brown-crimson.

For some unknowable reason he wants to laugh.

On a number of different levels, he did not see it going this way. Did not see himself going this way. It's absurd.

At least it's original. Might make for a decent story.

“Christ,” Michonne is muttering. “Jesus fuckin’ Christ.” She's scared - he can hear it wound through her voice like the trembling of a plucked string, and he doesn't like that. Michonne hardly ever sounds scared; he could probably count the times on one hand if he cared to. There's nothing to be scared of here. Every single one of them is going to get taken out sometime. It's simply a question of when and how.

Except then he hears _her_ voice, coming from the same place in his head as the initial bolt of pain did, a part of his brain so deep that it'll likely be one of the last things to die when the oxygen finally cuts off. Her voice, and she's speaking with that confident, insistent tone she has, which he simultaneously loves and is driven insane by.

_She's scared because she doesn't wanna lose you, you idiot. She's scared because she cares about you, and she hates the idea of a world without you in it._

_She hates the idea of having to go home alone._

It's still so difficult for him to conceive of. Let alone believe.

Light slap against his cheek, and he winces. “You gotta stay with me,” she's hissing through her teeth. “Okay? Don't you make me drag your damn carcass home, you asshole. Don't you dare.”

Her fear is making her aggressive. That's good. Good because there's fight in it, and good because it's controlled aggression. The kind you can use.

He’s seen her backed into a corner. He would have expected nothing less from her.

He's trying to do what she says, trying to give her that much courtesy. He's not going to be able to stay with her for long, and she must have blinded herself with her own stubborn desperation if she thinks he is, but he can try until he can't try anymore. He can try until he can't do anything anymore, ever.

And it's not even just for her. Again that sweet voice, though he can no longer make out what she's saying. Sounds like she might be singing to him. He would have hoped it would be one of the last things he heard, and all at once he wants to cry instead of laugh, because she's not going to see him again, and neither is Rick, and Michonne is going to bear the burden of telling them, and even if it's not in any way, shape, or form her fault, she’ll bear it all the same.

No part of this is fair. Life has never been fair and he would react with fine scorn to the suggestion that it should be so, but it's not, and anger wells up in him to churn with the sadness. She deserves better. They all do. Always have.

He hears himself as if from a long way off - a jagged croak with more strength behind it than he would have guessed he has. Sunlight scattered over his half-closed lids, through her hair like leaves. Like she's a tree to which he can anchor himself. He's not even sure which she his brain is referring to anymore.

_Beth. Tell… Tell ‘em._ Michonne leaning closer, and a glimpse of her strong features twisted with anxiety. _You tell ‘em both. Her and Rick. You tell ‘em I'm sorry… I'm sorry I didn't come back._

He knows - in a vague way that will clarify itself only much later - that for someone with Michonne’s powers of perception and analysis this is as good as a confession, and he doesn't care. It's way past time to worry about that. He’s way past fearing judgment for it.

_You tell ‘em I’m sorry I didn't come back to ‘em. I wanted to. I would’ve._

He can't see her anymore. Oil is welling up at the edges of his vision and seeping all through it, drowning the brighter blurs in darkness. At last he disobeys her again, lets go and allows himself to sink into it. He's too tired to hold on and the black is warm and peaceful and welcoming, no pain following him into it. But her voice is, and just before he's too far down for even that to reach him, he hears her one last time.

Not that he's in much of a state to parse her tone, but he thinks she sounds a bit surprised. Surprised, and comprehending.

_I ain't telling them shit. You got something to tell them, you tell them yourself._

Of course she wouldn't simply give him up, even as he's slipping away. She’ll argue with him to the end.

As before, he would have expected nothing less.

~

He was always decidedly agnostic about the prospect of an afterlife, though he was reasonably certain that if anything remotely like a Heaven existed, he wasn't getting into that particular club. If forced to come down on one side or another, he would have erred on the side of nonexistence, and not merely because he found it the more comforting of the two options. But apparently there _is_ an afterlife, and it's not one he ever would have imagined. Because it hurts, a _lot,_ and it involves a lot of movement, jostling, him being forced to use his arms and legs and then a firm band of what feels like bone and muscle wrapped around his chest. More dappled fragments of sunlight dancing across what little remains of his field of vision, and when they begin to fade into a second round of darkness, the sensations don't fade with it. They do fade in and out, but they're never gone for long.

Her voice, and hot puffs of breath in his ear. Grunts of effort. Full dark for some immeasureable length of time, then light again, and voices. Lots, loud and frightened. More movement and falling in slow motion. Brighter light, and the pain suddenly leaps up like lighter fluid on a fire and sears through him, and he whines and tries feebly to roll away.

Maybe this is Hell. If so, it's one of the _weirder_ versions of it that he's ever encountered.

Anyway, whatever and wherever this is, there is at least some species of mercy here. Because every shard of agonizing sensory input abruptly recedes and is gone.

Only, he thinks as the last of it leaves him, there was something else. There was one voice out of all the others, and the briefest glimpse of a face he knows.

Rick shouldn't be here too. Even if Rick was dead, he should get his own pocket of confusing perdition. Yet.

No idea what the fuck that is. But it's something.

~

He'll never be able to pinpoint the moment he grasped the fact that he was alive. He simply - eventually - did.

And very soon after that he grasped the complications.

~

Sunlight. Not broken, not dappled, and not obscured. It streams over him, bright enough to make him wince, and he lifts an instinctive hand to shield his eyes. His hand feels heavy - all of him does, hand and arm and his tongue when he shifts it the cradle of his jaw, and that's when the full force and intensity of his own thirst punches him square in the throat. A grating noise claws its way out of him, and he's making a very ill-advised attempt to push himself up - catching a glimpse of a thick white wrapping of gauze over his stomach - when a hand settles in the center of his chest and pins him down with gentle firmness, as the wet rim of a bottle presses against his lips and cold water spills onto his tongue.

He swallows, moans his gratitude, and finally his eyes focus and meet Rick’s, clear and blue and soft in a way he's rarely seen.

But he has seen it.

There are dark hollows under those uncharacteristically soft eyes, and the face beneath them is pinched and drawn and in severe need of a shave - moreso than normal. It's not only weariness; it's the kind of weariness that follows in the wake of shock and fear, and this he's _definitely_ seen before, lit and thrown into sharp relief by low candlelight, bending over a farmhouse bed and the little boy lying there.

Out of danger by then. So there was no more fear. Only the exhaustion, and seeing him that way, later on, Daryl remembers being transfixed by the sheer density of what might wring someone out like that. How much they would have to care.

Alien, the idea that anyone would ever be so drained over him. So alien that he only considers it now, and perceives how impossible it would have been to imagine. That Will Dixon would have ever in his life looked that way over either of his sons, that he would have done anything with Carl other than spit a string of curses at him for getting his dumb, useless ass shot off, and add with slurred belligerence that he probably had it coming, that if he survives and spends the rest of his life in a wheelchair shitting into a bag or whatever it'll only be an appropriate outcome.

Didn't even bear thinking about.

Now Rick is looking at him, and he can't breathe.

Then he can, and the flex of his diaphragm hurts - not helped by the fact that, insanely and not for the first time - he wants to laugh at the ludicrousness of it all.

Rick’s fingers on his face, rough and cool, as the bottle is withdrawn. He licks the moisture off his lips and finds himself pressing into the touch, sparing only a fraction of his attention for the concern that they might be seen. They're alone in the cell, as far as he can see, but the curtain isn't pulled and they're exposed to whoever might happen to walk by. Doesn't matter, though. Shouldn’t. Might be anything anyway, contact like this. Rick touching his cheek isn't exactly a makeout session.

Except for how it almost is.

“Hey,” Rick murmurs, and then: “Take it easy. You got a lotta mending to do.”

_I shouldn't be mending at all because I should be dead,_ he tries to say, but the words don't come in that selection, combination, or order. Instead, he hears himself whisper something a lot shorter and a lot simpler.

“Thought… I wasn't comin’ back.”

Rick coughs, glances down and away, though he doesn't remove his hand. It might be a laugh. It's not. “Yeah, you weren't the only one.”

He licks his lips again. “How long?”

“How long were you out, you mean?” Rick rolls a shoulder. “Not that long. Michonne brought you in last night. It's late afternoon now.” He tips his chin at something by Daryl’s opposite side. “You need to rest, all the blood you lost. Even with that.”

Daryl turns his head, follows the thin tube from where it's taped to his arm all the way up the IV stand they scavenged from the infirmary, the clear bag of thick dark red hanging there. It looks as if it would be warm to the touch, and for some reason he shivers.

“No one knew your blood type, but Yolanda - you remember, you brought her in with her son a couple weeks back. Well, as luck would have it, she's a universal donor.” Rick’s voice is edged with wry amusement. “Nothing but luck inside and out, huh.”

If he had the energy and the inclination, he might be ready to argue with that little assertion, but energy or no, the inclination isn't there. Because he's alive. He's alive, and for now he's going to stay that way. And he came home.

His luck is outrageous. He knows this.

“Beth?”

“Upstairs. She had a rough night, told her I'd get her once you were awake and talking.” Something flickers behind Rick’s eyes - soft all over again, cool easing into a strange kind of warmth, but not tranquil. Not calm. Those waters are unsettled, and Daryl doesn't have to be at the top of his observational game to see it.

What happened?

_Not now._

He manages what feels like a very weak smile. “You gonna get her, then?”

Rick clears his throat, shakes himself as if abruptly recalling something he had forgotten. Yes, definitely. There's a great big unspoken Something here, and Daryl can tell that once he's got enough of his shit together, maybe it'll be a thing to worry about. “Yeah. Yeah, I'll-”

“Get s’more of that water first?”

“Oh. Sure.” Rick leans over to retrieve the bottle, and this time Daryl can steady it himself as he tilts his head up to drink. He's still thirsty, seems somehow even more with every swallow, and by the time he stops and exhales and gives Rick a bob of his chin, he's drunk all there is.

“I’ll bring back a refill,” Rick says, capping the bottle with a small, wry smile - and then he does something Daryl doesn't expect, wouldn't have expected of him at all, and yet isn't surprised by once it's happening: he bends over as he's rising, ducks his head, grazes their lips together.

Just a second or two. Light as a whisper. But it pulls another little moan from him, and a whole new kind of shiver rolls up his spine. Light as the kiss, but it's deep.

It touches everything.

“I was so damn scared,” Rick breathes. He's still hovering, mouth practically moving against Daryl’s cheek, and that's when Daryl realizes that he's trembling too. Barely perceptible, but he is. “Thought you were dying when I saw you. Thought you were dead.”

Once more words are deserting him, giving up on his block-headed inability to make proper use of them. This is yet more undeniably empirical proof of what it was so utterly impossible for him to imagine all those months ago: that anyone would care enough about him to be terrified by the thought of a world without him.

He knew. But he didn't _know_. And the knowledge is coalescing into a lump in his throat, robbing him of his last chance at speech.

And he should say _something_ to that. Even if he has no idea what the fuck it would be.

_Me too._

But then - unknowingly or not - Rick is sparing him, straightening up and turning to the cell door, which is naturally when a poorly chosen pairing of words finally do make an appearance, and he probably shouldn't say them but he does anyway.

“Michonne knows.”

Rick halts. Freezes. Doesn't turn, and Daryl’s gut lurches in a way that has nothing to do with nearly being torn out. This is another thing he was keenly aware of but never thought about as an immediate reality - that they've been not only passively but actively keeping this secret, and that sooner or later that's not going to work anymore.

Sooner or later it's going to get out, and there's nothing any one of the three of them can do about that.

But Rick merely nods. Once, short, and he doesn't turn, and Daryl’s positive he's not mistaking the tension in the set of Rick’s shoulders, but he can't detect any alarm anywhere in that affect. No panic. Not even really any anxiety, not that he can identify.

“Yeah.” Beat of silence. “I know.”

_Okay_.

Before he can say anything else, there's no one present to say it to.

~

The world goes gray for a brief time and then Beth is there, sinking into the chair by the bunk and bending over him almost as close as Rick had been, and once he sees the look on her face…

He's not thinking about anything else.

His name rides out of her on a single sharp exhalation, and then her head and hand are both on his bare chest, the clean, fresh smell of her hair filling his nose as the sunlight scatters through it and gilds each strand, and she's warm and small and inescapable, something that might be a shuddering laugh slipping out of her as he hooks an awkward arm over her back and holds onto her.

Could well be simply a hug. Chaste. She hugs people - it's just a thing she does. No one would look at Beth Greene hugging someone and assume they're fucking her.

These are the things he tells himself, even as the rest of his mind is lost in her and this embrace that he was all but certain he would never feel again. This incredible blessing that she is.

He doesn't need her to tell him she was scared for it to be conceivable. Believable. He's through doubting it.

_I'm alright,_ he thinks he might be murmuring, which is stupid, because she can see perfectly well that he is, and also because he's pretty clearly _not_ all right even if he's eventually going to be, but it doesn't matter. It's possible that he's not even saying it strictly for her, his voice drifting through the golden cloud of her hair and over her wonderfully smooth skin to the man standing by the cell’s entrance and watching both of them with hooded eyes - but also a minuscule smile playing around the corners of his mouth.

His own continuing, low-key astonishment at the fact that he's here to begin with. That he made it. That the possibility of his total absence frightened them so badly. That him returning to them meant so much.

_I’m alright._

Because one way or another, all three of them will be.

~

But then, after they leave, there's Michonne.

They don't stay long. No one speaks much. That's fine; there's not much to say, nothing that isn't patently self-evident. Or there might be, it's possible that there's more, but it can wait. He's here and they're with him, home and these two people with whom he's found something he had no idea was even possible, and the warmth he feels permeating his body has nothing whatsoever to do with his dick.

It's them. It's about them. He doesn't understand, but he thinks he might understand enough.

Then they're gone, and Michonne is there what seems like seconds after, leaning in the doorway with one hand loosely grasping the bars and her head angled slightly to one side. Casual-like, when he can see in every muscle a quiet tension that tells him she's anything but. A tension not at all unlike what he saw in Rick, after he said what he said.

_Michonne knows._

A few seconds of regarding him in silence, and he guesses it's possible that she's waiting to be invited in. So he grunts, jerks his chin at the chair by the bunk and she pads over and sits down in what seems like a single smooth motion. More feline than the feline that almost offed him, he thinks, and doesn't fight back the smile.

She returns it, elbows resting on her knees and her hands clasped between them. When Michonne smiles it’s an event that transforms her entire face, her entire _self,_ and it's a good thing to see.

Doesn't happen near enough.

“Hi.” She pauses, quick scan down to the bandages and back up. “You look better.”

He coughs a laugh. “Yeah. Still look like shit, though.”

“That's not always?”

Another laugh. It’s still painful and he doesn't care; he’ll get his laughs in while he can. If he learned nothing else from this little adventure, he should have learned that. “Fuck you.” He sighs, reaches out a hand, and after a second or two she slaps their palms lightly together, leather on bare skin, and gives him a quick squeeze before releasing him.

He's tired. But he can stay conscious for a short while longer. She could just be looking in on him, yes, but he doubts that's all. She's here _for_ something.

“Thanks.”

She shakes her head. “It's what we do.”

“Yeah, I know it is. But thanks.”

He falls back into silence, half closes his eyes. The light streaming into the cell has either shifted enough to lessen its brightness, or he's simply accustomed enough for it to no longer bother him, but the reddish dimness behind his lids is still preferable.

And he's got nothing else to say. As with Beth and Rick, there just isn't much. He's here. So is she. He thanked her. Now, if there's more, it's on her to bring it up.

So it's no great surprise when she does, her voice very low and very steady, and another thing that's no great surprise when he opens his eyes and turns his head to look at her is the utter lack of judgment in her expression.

“So you've got a thing with them? Him and her?” Before he can answer, she adds, “You don't have to tell me. It's none of my business.”

“No, it ain't.” He sighs again. There's no point in dodging this. Not with her. It's not even that hard to say, and not just because this cat is out of its bag and three counties over. “But yeah. I do.”

“Both of ‘em? All three of you?”

Single nod. Other people, even having seen and heard what she has, might not have leaped to a conclusion that unconventional in a world that's already extremely weird basically all of the time, but this is Michonne, and if anyone would pick up on it before everyone else did…  
  
Carol. Carol might have, if Michonne didn't. But regardless.

Another tiny smile flickers at the corners of his mouth. She asked for no details, for nothing beyond affirmative or negative, but he's comfortable enough offering up at least one.

“It's good. It's… It’s a real good thing.”

_The kind of real good thing you hide from everyone?_ he half expects her to say, and he hasn't the first clue how he would respond to that aside from acknowledging its essential truth. Wouldn't issue a defense; not confident there is one. _It might look really fucking bad to just about everyone_ might count, but as a defense it sounds in his mind as if it might need some defending all on its own.

It is what it is.

But she says nothing either way. She merely pulls in a breath and ducks her head, brow furrowed. Possibly a bit perturbed, but not upset by it. Once he would have assumed she would be, would have assumed everyone would be, but he knows what they used to think of him - just some redneck asshole, useful so far as it went but not exactly the kind of fucker you bring home for dinner - and now they all know better.

He's a redneck asshole, absolutely. Obviously. But he's not a predator. He's not a bad man. And as far as dinner guests go, he's not ideal, but one could most certainly do worse.

These people _like_ him. When this all started, he was afraid - on a deep level - that if what’s going on came out, that might change. But he’s been given to understand that near-death experiences have a way of bringing things into new focus, and now he's not so sure it would.

“I'm not saying anything to anyone,” she says at last. Still low, quiet. “Like I said, ain't my business. But you gotta know, if it slipped with me, sooner or later it's gonna get out to everyone. You might wanna get out in front of that. That's all.” She pushes to her feet, bends and lays her fingers lightly against his forearm. “Rest up. Doc’ll be by in a bit to check the dressings.”

He confines his answer to a grunt and returns himself to the comfort of the red dimness. That _short while_ within the bounds of which he could stay conscious is rapidly coming to an end. But he hears the soft scuffle of her shoes halt, cracks a lid, and sees her half turned and looking back at him, an odd smile just visible in the curve of her lips. Not the smile it's good to see, but this one isn't bad.

“I know why you've all been keeping it quiet. Or I can guess. But Daryl… If it's really _good,_ maybe you don't need to worry about it. Not so much, anyway.”

And she's gone.

Then he is too. Like it was right after this happened and he let go for what he thought might be the final time, it's a relief. There's still pain, but more than anything there's the gently muffling embrace of oblivion. Even better now that he's reasonably confident he'll get to come back.

But on the way down he's mulling, with the parts of his mind that are still able to mull, on what she said. On what she suggested. That they _get out in front of it_. That they don't need to worry. If it's good.

It is. It's weird and filthy and more than a little twisted - but those things aren't all it is. Maybe not even the most of it. They started out taking a pretty girl fast and hard bent over in the generator room of a goddamn prison, but that's not where it is now. It's here, like this: Beth’s head on his chest, and the sweet pressure of Rick’s lips.

So no. Maybe they don't need to worry at all.

 


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally back in his own cell, Daryl is itchy and in pain and can't seem to chase sleep down. Fortunately he has a couple of thoughtful friends to provide him with a distraction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys wanted healing blowjobs. You're welcome. ❤️

He can't get the fuck _comfortable._

He was looking forward to sleeping in his own damn cell, in his own damn bunk. Feels like he's been waiting a damn week for it, though it's only been a couple of days, but even that couple of days was something he found himself resenting, because if he's going to _take it easy_ he can do that anywhere. Doesn't need to be in the makeshift infirmary they've set up. Fuck’s sake, the slashes aren't even that deep, it's not like he's going to rip open the stitches just taking a fucking walk down the cell block, it's not like he hasn't had worse more times than he can count on one hand, and what it amounts to is that he grumbled his way into what he wanted - though he’s aware that he probably would have gotten it anyway - and now he's in his own cell, in his own bunk, middle of the damn night when he should be sawing the biggest thickest log in the whole damn forest, and he can't get the fuck _comfortable._

Prison, he thinks as he rolls onto his back, clenching his jaw against the light twinge of pain in his gut. Prison was never supposed to be comfortable. He still has enough of a mental connection to the world of Before to know that the pre-Turn version of himself would never regard this as comfortable - and it's not like he was exactly possessed of luxurious tastes. But standards change as times do, and while no one would mistake him for some kind of fucking homemaker, a _nester,_ he likes what he's made in here.

His own space. It's spartan, utilitarian - bow, gun, ammunition, clothes, a couple of books, one or two other things, and a thin mattress with worn pillows and threadbare sheets. No decorations to speak of. No frills. No homey little touches. No flowers or whatever, no art on the walls. No softness but the softness of age and wear. Not much color.

He's not Beth.

But it's _his_. And he hadn't realized just how much that meant to him until he was stuck somewhere else.

Now he's here at last, curtain pulled and everything gone dark and quiet, and he wants nothing more than to take his leave of consciousness - consciousness, and the discomfort that consciousness currently involves.

Which of course is why he's stuck _here._

He blinks sullenly at the shadows gathering over him. He feels like they're taunting him. They're right there within reach; wouldn't he like to disappear into them? Oh well, too bad, they're not taking him. Sleep is a club he's waiting outside, watching a burly man in a bad suit pretending to consult a clipboard, praying that he's on the list and knowing that he's not, because sleep is very exclusive and the fact is that he's not good enough for it. He's not attired for it. He's too torn up. He's too much of a wreck in every way that counts. The wiring of his nervous system is a tangled mess, and when he approaches the bouncer and dares to ask if he can get in, the bouncer barks a mean laugh and thrusts a hand against his solar plexus to push him back.

A flare of pain from the base of his spine to the nape of his neck, and it's only after his eyes fly open that he realizes he was _almost_ there.

Wasn't a good dream, what he was cooking up, but a dream is a dream.

He slams a fist against the mattress, not trying to muffle his growl. So maybe he wakes someone else up. So fucking what. At least then he would have company.

He doesn't have anything more for the pain than a couple of Advil, which he's saving. Trying not to use at all. Telling himself that someone else will almost certainly need them more later than he does right now. But he might have to cave.

And to top it all off, beneath the pain, the wounds _are_ healing, and rapidly. Which means the stitches are beginning to itch, and he's almost grateful for the pain if for no other reason than that it's saving him from wanting to rip everything open.

He presses the heels of his palms against his closed eyes. All he's doing is making it worse. He knows this.

It doesn't help.

_Shit._

Maybe it's that he's thinking wistfully about other times when he's slept well. Maybe it's something else. Doesn't matter what it is, because regardless, at the end of it he discovers himself lying alone in this narrow prison bunk… and wishing that he wasn't quite so alone. Wishing the already narrow bunk was a little narrower. Wishing he was a little more cramped, a little too hot, not enough covers, someone’s elbow in his face or knee in his ass, strands of hair sticking to his lips.

That would be nice.

There's already no surplus of space in here, but it feels cavernous. Vast. He's adrift in it - and that's so fucking bizarre, because he used to _like_ being alone in here.

Didn't he?

Whatever. He's winding himself up. He needs to wind down. Normally a smoke would do that, but in general he doesn't smoke in here anymore, because there are a lot of people who aren't used to living in close quarters with him and it seems like only minimal common courtesy.

So unless he wants to toss that aside, it's off the table.

He slings an arm across his eyes, winces. If he doesn't watch it, his brain will start doing the thing it does where it finds a tail or two to chase and chases them round and round for hours, thinking and rethinking and never concluding a goddamn thing. He might think about being alone. Might think about Michonne, about what she knows - which he's pretty sure no one else knows yet, but he can't be certain. He might think about Rick’s smile, his hands and how good they felt on him even when he was hurting so bad, about Beth’s head a warmly comforting weight on his chest. About that first night she came to him and simply stayed, and he was indeed cramped and too hot and didn't sleep well, and it was wonderful.

Sleeping - or not - with a soft, small body tucked against his, and the rhythm of another breath and heartbeat to which he found himself matching his own.

He groans hollowly, wants to kick at the sheets. Wants to claw the itching out of his skin. Wants to hurl himself to his feet and charge outside and smoke a whole goddamn _pack_ of cigarettes.

Whisper of a footstep and the curtain twitches, and suddenly he's not thinking about the itch at all anymore.

It's not that he anticipates danger. He doesn't. But by now this is instinct as deep as any he has, and the fact is that he's an extraordinarily light sleeper anyway. Seconds to full alertness literally means the difference between survival and death, and he hasn't stayed alive this long by none of his own virtues.

But he also instantly knows who it is. Because he knows that footstep.

Knows them both.

The curtain pulls back. Beneath it slips a smaller shadow, followed by a larger. It hits him all at once, what the feet announced: the sound of their voices woven into their breathing, each minute detail of how they move, their mingled scents, the heat of their skin altering the ambient temperature. The way they're both advancing silently on him, and all he can do, all he wants to do, is lie here, half raised on his elbows, and watch them come.

His own breath is hitching, and it's not alarm. It's everything, all at once, and more than anything it's the sheer force of his relief, of wanting something and only realizing how much when you _finally_ get it.

_Think of the devil._

No. Not devils. Once he might have thought that way about the larger of these two shadows. But a lot of things have changed since then.

The smaller shadow stifles a giggle, and before he has a chance to process, it’s - _she’s_ \- taking up a position near the foot of the bunk, lowering herself to sit by his knees and running a slow hand up the top of his thigh. The larger shadow is very close, dropping down to kneel and leaning over him with a strong and delightfully familiar hand in the center of his chest, pressing him gently down onto the mattress.

He's dressed in boxers and a ragged tank top; that's all. That's all, and suddenly he feels very exposed in a way he doesn't in the least dislike.

Warm puff against his temple. Laughter. Then lips on his cheek, and he trembles, and trembles harder when Rick murmurs in his ear.

“Don't you move.” Not an order, not in how it's being said - but in another time and place he could see it being taken that way. “You just relax, now. We’re gonna take care of you. Aren't we, baby?”

“Mhmm.” Barely a hum, and he can hear the smile even if he can't see a single curve of it. “Real good care.”

If he sat up, he could reach her, and easily. Get his hands on her, her shoulders and waist and arms, her _tits,_ drag her in and clasp her while he… What? What does he want to do with her, to her? What exactly is his endgame? He doesn't _have_ one, which means he's hard and heavy as a wind-weathered stone and he has no plan for taking care of that, and he whimpers as her impish little hand descends on him without any further coyness and cups him through the thin fabric of his shorts.

He lets his head fall to the side as he cants his hips, and Rick’s mouth is there waiting for his, nudging his tongue between Daryl’s lips. Not yet exploring, simply there, and Daryl sighs and melts into him with a watery sensation that he can't interpret as anything other than even more intense relief.

Kissing Rick while Beth palms him, the whole thing so decadently slow - the rhythmic pressure of her hand and the same rhythm in the way Rick’s mouth is working over his, and the way both of them are coaxing his muscles loose and winding heated brilliance around the base of his cock and balls. Thickening, he's swelling, and not just there but everywhere, feeling like he's literally occupying more space, like everything is smaller and closer - to them.

Closer to them.

He smiles against Rick’s mouth and gets one in response, the curve of lips against his own.

“You know what she misses doing?” Rick breaks the kiss and Daryl lets out a quiet whimper of disappointment, but it slips into a a whole new range when those curving lips graze his ear and breath puffs against his skin. “Tell him, Beth. Tell him what you miss.”

It's as if everything skids to a halt for a sliver of a moment, her hand going almost imperceptibly still before it starts back up. Her more fundamental hesitation is palpable, and he doesn't think it's feigned. And it's so funny: after everything, after what they've done together and what she's _made_ them do, she trips now and then. There's no longer any question in his mind: she's the boldest of the three of them, the most solidly in control, and yet.

There's something about it that gets him even harder.

“I miss…” She sighs, and it's a needy, almost wistful sound. “I miss when you… when you fuck me. I miss when you’re in me.”

“Good girl. What else?”

“When you're in my mouth,” she whispers, her voice husky, and when Daryl forces his eyes open he sees her leaning over him, staring up at him with eyes that seem to glow with their own light, and it's far too dim to make it out but he knows she's blushing fiercely.

Rick raises his head, and the exasperation in his voice _is_ feigned. Mostly. “More than that. You want it, you gotta tell him.”

She hauls in a breath, and when she speaks it's in a staccato rush. “I miss your cock. In my mouth. I miss when it's hard like this, I miss how it tastes, you taste so good, I miss how you fill me up when you come-”

“There you go.” Rick sounds gratified, flicks his tongue against Daryl’s ear and earns himself a violent shiver. “What d’you say? Can she? Can she suck you off?”

“ _Shit._ ” He might be on the edge of peals of laughter. “Yeah, _Christ._ ” And then Rick is cutting off anything else he might have come up with - not that there's a whole lot else to be said - and just about eating him alive, lips forcing his apart and tongue lashing over his, and that's when he fully gets it.

Beth is not the only one who's been missing things. Beth is not the only one who wants this, and bad.

A hoarse groan pushes out of him as he hooks a hand over the back of Rick’s neck and pulls him in, deepens the kiss even further, groans louder and is vaguely thankful to have it swallowed as Beth slides her fingers into the slit in his shorts and draws him out. Cool air on his overheated skin, the heat at the points of her fingertips, and the pleasure rolling down his shaft from the sheer presence of her touch. Her hand is _amazing,_ was even when it was decidedly unpracticed, and he's certain someone less _couth_ would make a crack about her doing this professionally.

Good sweet lord, would he shell out.

She tugs lightly at his foreskin, strokes him to the base and back up, and his hips twitch as his teeth close on Rick’s bottom lip. His belly is hurting, a dull ache instead of the sharper sting he would have felt only a day ago, but he couldn't possibly give any less of a shit.

His dick is in a pretty girl’s soft hand and a man’s tongue is licking roughly into his mouth, and the fact is that now and then, he barely recognizes himself.

That's not necessarily a bad thing.

Another upward twitch when her breath flows so warm over his slick head, and then he's moaning helplessly as she laps all the way up the underside of his shaft, fastens her lips around him and sucks gently. Again he's thinking _fucking professional,_ and he's never had a multi-thousand-dollar-a-night whore, hardly ever paid more than fifty and that was Merle anyway, but once more he's spinning it into a churning semi-fantasy. How he would pay. He would so totally lay that cash down for her.

He should be horrified by this line of thinking. It's like Rick is in his head.

Well. Technically that _is_ happening, so.

He gropes for her head, cups the back of it, combs his fingers through her hair and fights the urge to push her down. Hold her there and fuck her mouth until she's gagging. He missed this. He missed this so _much._

For a few terrible hours, he genuinely believed he would never have it again.

She swirls her clever little tongue and takes him deeper, letting out a breathy _mmm_ as she does, and at that instant Rick breaks the kiss again, nips his jaw. Rick is grinning and it's wide and more than a bit evil.

“That good? She doing good?”

He nods. Scrapes together enough coherence for a word. “Yeah.”

“I missed this too.” And Daryl is distantly surprised Rick is out-and-out saying it, so nakedly authentic, though he's not entirely sure why it's something to be surprised by and probably shouldn’t be. “I missed watching her do this to you. Jesus, you look so fucking good with your dick down her slutty throat-”

Rick is shivering. Rick is shivering, and Daryl knows as sure as he's ever known anything that if he reached between Rick’s legs, his hand would meet a cock even harder than his.

And Rick isn't doing anything about it.

Seems unfair. But when he actually tries it, fumbling at such a clumsy angle that he wouldn't be able to do much even if he got there, Rick swats him away. “Cut that out. This is about you.”

 _But it's what I want,_ he tries to say - tries to _start_ to say - and Rick is silencing him again, palm against his jaw and turning his head. He honestly thought Rick couldn't kiss him any deeper but apparently he was wrong, and as their moans collide and combine he's not thinking about fucking the mouth of a ten thousand dollar whore.

He's thinking about Rick fucking his.

He's thinking about Rick fucking him.

It hasn't exactly been sneaking up on him, he's been riding high for what feels like half an hour now, but all at once he's practically yanking at Beth’s head, because his climax is burning through his balls and he doesn't want this to be over so soon. Thank Christ, she gets the message, but he feels the wave rise almost to the breaking point, and his abs seize up in a way that jerks a pained whine out of him.

“You okay?” Beth, concerned, though she hasn't let go of him. “Do you need-”

“ _No,_ ” he grunts, a little frantic, twists her hair tighter around his fingers. Hovering over him, Rick is silent. Observing. “‘m fine. ‘m fine, don't…”

“You want her to keep going?”

He hears the amusement dancing along the edges of Rick’s tone, and that's when he understands that he's in trouble. But he nods fitfully anyway, because he's a lost fucking cause.

“Say please. Ask her nice.”

“Beth… Please, please keep goin’.” Whatever he says, it's not going to be enough. Whatever he comes up with, Rick is going to demand more. “Don't. Don't stop.”

Beth laughs softly, delightedly, and her fingertips flutter across his throbbing balls.

“You think he really wants it, baby?”

“Mm. Maybe.” She sounds thoughtful, gives him a flick of her kitten tongue, and he bites his own to keep from whining even louder.

“Fuckin’ Christ, girl, _please._ ” He can't afford shame. “Oh my God, I fuckin’ _need_ it, please.”

Giggle. Another slow stroke, and he's losing his mind. She's dragging it out of him, and somewhere an asshole named Rick Grimes is desperately wrestling back his laughter. “‘cause I'm good?”

 _You are literally worth the contents of Fort goddamn Knox._ “Girl. You're so good.”

“Okaaay.” As if she's giving in and she's not altogether sure about it, and then she's swallowing him whole, taking him until he bottoms out against the back of her throat, slides out and into that smooth wet paradise as she bobs her head and idly toys with his balls. He's not pushing her now, merely hanging on, sobbing into Rick’s mouth as Rick grips his jaw and pins him down.

He could die. He could die right now.

Not really, but yeah.

“You gonna come?” Rick hisses, nips him harder. “You gonna shoot your come in her whore mouth for me? For us?” For a wonder and a mercy, he doesn't wait for a response that Daryl isn't at all confident he could provide. “Yeah, you feed it to her. You give her what she wants. You give this little slut what she's been missing.”

He can only interpret Beth’s hum as agreement, and then he can't interpret anything at all because his fucking head is cracking open and Rick is covering his ragged cry, biting at his tongue, Beth sucking him and jerking him and milking every drop of it out of him. Hands spasming, everything spasming, and then it drops him and all his bones pour out like water.

Lying there, gasping and shuddering as Beth gives him a final lick and Rick’s kiss softens so suddenly it makes him dizzy.

For a moment that stretches out, they're gentle with him. They're soothing him with careful, delicate touches as the pain reasserts itself - and somehow right now even the pain isn't unpleasant. He lies in it, dazed, his cock going as limp as the rest of him and his whole body unfurling under their hands.

Then they're up and moving, and he turns his head and blinks, confused, as Rick grabs a chair from the corner and hauls it into the middle of the floor, heedless of the scraping. Gingerly, he levers himself up enough to see what they're doing, still confused but rapidly less so. He's getting it.

There's not a lot to get.

They didn't bother with his clothes aside from the necessary rearrangements, and they scarcely bother with each other's. Daryl’s eyes have adjusted and now he can really make her out, her wild mess of blond hair gone silver-gray in the meager light, her slender limbs moving with that familiar odd, gawky grace as she shimmies down her shorts and leaves only her camisole with one strap hanging loose off her shoulder. Rick sinks into the chair; he's still dressed in his jeans and button-down, like he just now came in from the yard, and he releases a sound that's closer to a growl than a chuckle as together they fumble at his belt and fly.

There's nothing slow in how she pulls Rick’s cock free, nothing careful, and she swings a leg across his lap, tosses her head back and bites her lip as she lowers herself swiftly onto him.  And they're moving, Rick’s arms hooked around her waist as he leans back to watch her ride him, his lips peeled back from his teeth in another one of those wolfish grins.

They're still trying to be quiet, and she's trying to keep the roll of her hips smooth enough to stop the chair from rattling against the poured concrete, but it's all she can do, and all she can do isn't quite enough. Daryl stares at them as they fuck, if anything even more dazed than before, and thinking _the others have to know, they have to hear this, they all have to know what this is._

Only they don't. They never could. There's no way he could ever explain this to anyone, what it's like to lie here with his softening dick flopped out of his shorts, her spit and his come still cooling on his skin, watching these two people fuck and knowing that it's for them but it's also truly a show for his benefit. In its gritty roughness, its clumsiness, in how it _isn’t_ like a show at all.

They're just fucking, and they want him to see it.

“Oh, _shit, yeah,_ fuck me _._ Fuck me _hard._ ” Tight, grating whisper, and he listens, stunned; lord, she has a mouth on her when she lets all that shyness go. “Fuck me with your big cock, Rick, it feels so _good,_ it feels so good in my pussy, _yes._ ” Whipping her head to the side then and meeting Daryl’s eyes, her own fiery hot and bright, and he can't fight back his low moan.

If he could come again this soon, he would be shooting all over the fucking sheets.

Rick can, and suddenly he's stiffening and slapping her off him, grasping his dick by the base and only just managing to trap his snarl in his throat as he jerks come in glistening ropes over his lap and his fist. Beth barely managed to save herself from a tumble and she crouches, gazing up at him, and as he hunches over, panting, she crawls between his legs and begins to lick his sticky fingers.

Daryl collapses against the pillow, blinking slowly. Still watching. His hands feel numb, his toes, the rest of him buzzing densely enough to wash out the itch and the pain.

They're so beautiful. Like this, like they were, like they always are together. Like they've been from the start. Beautiful, and this is what he truly missed. Her sweet mouth, absolutely. The things she can do with it, more than he could ever hope to put in words. But really it's this - and he still doesn't even know what _this_ is.

Rick is slowly stroking her hair with his other hand as she continues to clean him, his focus shifting from her up to Daryl as a long, shaky breath escapes him.

Daryl doesn't know what this is. What he knows is that he almost didn't get to find out, and that's not something he's going to allow again.

Michonne was right. And it's good.

And he's got no more time to waste.

 


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are mornings after, and then there are Mornings After, and Rick Grimes is using this one to come to some decisions and make some moves. Baby steps, yes, but sometimes baby steps are the biggest ones.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You'll note that there's a very big part of the resolution of this whole issue that _doesn't_ happen in this chapter. That's for two reasons: 1) I wanted to get something happy posted right now, and 2) I'm honestly not sure how much of that bigger resolution I want to depict in detail. Sometimes that kind of thing can be written smoothly and sometimes it can't, and I'm not certain yet which is the case here, and I don't want to write it if I can't do so smoothly. But I'll do my best, and in the meantime I hope you'll enjoy this bit of Rick-and-Daryl sweetness. 
> 
> This fic isn't over - I don't think. I'm not going to mark it as complete, anyway, though I do think this could serve adequately as an ending. There's more that I want to explore here, though, so I wouldn't expect this to be the last update. 
> 
> Regardless, thank you so much for reading along this far. Which, wow, is well over a year now. That's cool.
> 
> ❤️

He doesn't have to look for her. He already knows where she's going to be.

He doesn't have to look for her, but for what feels like hours, he looks _at_ her, standing there in the yard all bathed in morning rose-gold, her hair unbound and his daughter in her arms. How many times has he done this exact thing? How many times did he do it before the rain and the dress and the moment of madness that he wouldn't take back now if he could? He thought it happened suddenly. Consciously or unconsciously, he did actually convince himself that it was a sudden thing, a genuine _moment_ where wanting her arrived fully formed and ready to take him over.

Now he's really not so sure. Because he leans in the doorway and with his eyes he follows her graceful, almost dancing steps back and forth as she rocks Judy into drowsing, and he knows there were times before that moment when he looked at her and thought she was beautiful.

She wasn't getting his dick hard then, no. Not like now. But even so.

Things have beginnings that you only recognize with the benefit of hindsight. The glimmer of something on the horizon, still a long way off but approaching fast. Seeing it in a rearview mirror is only a change of angle. Everything else is the same.

Except he didn't let her shoot past him. He reached out. Grabbed. Held on.

The exhale is so deep and so hard that it empties him out, slumps his shoulders, and he bows his head and pinches the bridge of his nose.

He's still not sure precisely what's going on here. Except there was the guard tower, and the moon, and his ring and the taste of Daryl Dixon’s come on his tongue and the memory of Beth Greene’s plump lips wrapped around his cock, and how he didn't feel like shit about either of those things, and there's also what he whispered to that moon. The proxy that moon served as. What he wanted to imagine was behind it. Present, though eclipsed.

_I know you wouldn't want me to be alone. I know that._

“She’s lookin’ good,” murmurs a rough voice from behind him. Close, breath a warm puff against his ear. “Our girl.”

Rick doesn't quite jump. He does smile. It's impossible not to; the truth is that everything in him _did_ jump, only it had nothing to do with surprise. Everything in his chest leaped, like cresting the top of a rollercoaster and plunging down.

“Yeah. She is.”

Last time they shared this exchange, it was preface to a plan that involved dragging her out of her bed in the dead of night and frog-marching her into the basement and fucking her until she was too exhausted to move. This time around, it doesn't feel like that.

Not that he wouldn't love to do that again.

He half turns his head, catching a glimpse of Daryl’s face - hair even more of a disheveled mess than usual, face still drawn and too pale. His chest does something entirely different, and he fights it back. He doesn't want to remember that night now, the darkness and the awful light and the red sheen of the blood and the ragged edges of torn flesh. Those things have no place here in the soft light of a soft morning.

“Should you be up and walking around?”

Daryl grunts. He sounds faintly amused. “Fuck you. ‘m fine.”

“Course you are.” He’ll drop it. He didn't want to make a thing of it anyway. Instead he leans back slightly - hardly at all, but enough to bring their bodies into contact, spine against shoulder, hip brushing hip. For a few seconds, nothing at all; then the warm weight of a hand at his waist. More than a hand. An arm sliding halfway around his middle, and he leans more firmly into it and sighs.

If anyone sees this.

If anyone sees this… so what, exactly?

The sun rises higher. The birds trill in the treeline. In the distance, the walkers hiss and groan. Been a long time since their sounds genuinely bothered him, at least in and of themselves. These days it's all about proximity.

“We gotta do something about this,” he says quietly, and he knows he won't have to lay out what he means. He's not the only one thinking it, and not just because of Michonne. It's been coming for a while. As he thought, fighting back nausea on that night he refuses to remember now, this is not sustainable. There comes a point at which sneaking around transitions from being a fun, naughty little game into being a legitimate problem, and while he doesn't get the sense they've hit that point quite yet…

Probably good to avoid hitting it at all.

He still has no clear notion of what he wanted when he got into this, aside from her _._ But one thing he's certain he didn't want, ever, was for anyone to get hurt.

“Mm.”

Quiet. He can feel Daryl thinking, the wheels turning - both methodically and rapidly. His mind is nimble, and if anything it's inclined to work overtime. First time he laid eyes on him, spoke to him, he wrote him off as dumbass white trash with no self-control. It was impossible _not_ to; it was all he saw, and it's not as if Daryl was providing him with much in the way of reasons to think otherwise. But he learned. He learned fast.

Daryl might get ahead of him here, might already be there, and that would be fine.

Finally: “How the fuck do you tell someone about this?” Edge of amused bewilderment. Daryl isn't worried, but he is at a bit of a loss. Must be. “How it works. _I_ don't even fuckin’ get it.”

“Me neither. But we gotta.” Yet again he pauses, eyes locked on her. This beautiful fucking girl - _beautiful,_ and sure, again: When he saw her in the rain like that he wanted to screw her, shove his dick in her pussy and make her wail… but that was never all of it, because he saw her before that. Didn't see her as more than a child at the farm, because a child is what she was, but in so many ways, that was a different world, and just everything that could change _has_ changed since then.

And he's seen her. He's seen her holding his daughter. He's watched her walk back and forth soaked in sunlight, cradling his little girl, and he's listened to her sing. There's a brightness to her, and what he's coming to understand is that one way or another, he's been seeking that brightness for a long damn time. Not since he lost who he always believed was the one great love of his life, but since not long after.

This truth needs a reckoning.

“She deserves it.” He finds that he's smiling. Not wide, but he feels it down to his bones. He's _happy_ , no less freaked out for it and Christ knows what's going to come of this, but for now, in this moment, he's happy. “She deserves better than sneaking around.”

Daryl releases a breath. “Yeah.”

“So do you.”

Soft grunt - this time of surprise. Vague confusion. Of course that's his reaction; as far as Daryl is concerned, he doesn't _deserve_ things. He gets them, they come to him, but if they do, it's by some ineffable grace rather than anything he earned. It would be sweet if there wasn't something so terrible behind it.

Rick doesn't know all of what. But maybe, in time, he will. And in the meantime he has plenty of his own suspicions.

It's not as if he hasn't seen the scars.

“You do. You deserve it. Ain't gotta be a secret. Ain’t gotta hide it from anyone.” He's turning in the hook of Daryl’s arm, relishing the strength mostly dormant in it despite the fact that the owner of that arm is still recovering and still weak. Not weak at all, not really, and it's not difficult in the end to shift his attention from the lovely girl in the yard to the man standing so close to him, to reach up and frame Daryl’s face with his hands, stubble pleasantly scratchy against his palms.

“I don't get it either.” He breathes a laugh, and for a second or two he drops his eyes, shakes his head. “I don't get wanting it like this. But it’s not the same world. Y’know? It's not like it was.” He sweeps his thumb across Daryl’s lips, and they're warm and they're also dry, and he covers them briefly with his and moistens them with his tongue, feels Daryl stiffen against him - and relax.

Same pattern. Always. Nearly pulling away before you press in. And possibly at some point the first part won't be there at all.

“I want it,” he whispers, lips still ghosting against Daryl’s as the words come. “I want you. Ain't just about fucking. I mean, don't get me wrong, that part’s great.” Quick flicker of a grin, and Daryl breathes a laugh, ducks his head. Rick doesn't try to stop him; he runs his thumbs up the sharp ridges of Daryl’s cheekbones and tips their foreheads together.

Feels good. Feels _right._

“I want you,” he repeats, very soft, and then he says nothing else for a while and feels the breeze pass gently over them, the growing warmth of the sun on the back of his neck. This will take some time to sink in, and there's nothing much else to say anyway-

Except there is. And perhaps it's not even his to say, perhaps he should wait for her, but if he's dealing with what he wants here, he's certain that he wants to say it anyway. Surely she wouldn't blame him. Not too much.

“She said she loves me.”

Saying it like that. Just… Just saying it. Putting the words on his tongue and sending them into the air. Making it real. He didn't know what to return it with at the time so he gave her only silence, and with anyone else he would probably be terrified that she would take that silence the wrong way, but she doesn't appear to have done so. She didn't seem bothered by it at all. She gave it to him and she let it go.

That's why he wants her. That she does that. That she _is_ that way. Better than he could ever be.

But maybe he can try.

Daryl has stiffened again, his breath quickening, and it might be a little ruthless to push ahead like this. Yet here they are, and here he is.

“She said she loves you too.”

That quick breath ceases.

He waits. He's calm. He's not afraid of whatever comes next. Because this is about what they _deserve,_ him and her, these people he's somehow found and who have found him, and what they deserve is the truth. The whole truth, nothing but, and everything it means.

“Rick.”

Small. Tiny, and Daryl _is_ afraid, trembling now, the terror radiating from him like heat and light, and Rick swallows it, pulling him in again and raking his fingers into Daryl’s tangled hair as he seals their mouths together. Words aren't exactly Daryl’s best friends, he knows that very well, and there are methods at his disposal beyond words. His tongue stroking across the other, soothing, as he parts his lips wider. An invitation.

Yet there are words, somewhere in there. They're so easy he barely notices them.

_I do. I love you. I love you, Daryl._

_Brother, I've loved you for so long._

Beth is singing. It's low, barely audible, but he hears it, and without breaking the kiss he opens his eyes. In the periphery of his vision he sees her, not facing them but looking at them over her shoulder as if she's sneaking a coy glance at something she shouldn't properly be observing. But she's smiling, those full sweet _cocksucker_ lips curving in clear delight, and moving as she sings.

She knows what he's done. She didn't have to hear it in order to know.

Hers isn't the only smile. Daryl isn't talking, and that's fine. It's enough to feel his hands settling at Rick’s waist and the way he's pressing their bodies full-length together, licking his way past Rick’s lips - still trembling slightly, but like everything else, it's different now.

Which is when he hears the creak of the door and a faint, shocked gasp, and he wants to crack the fuck up. No idea who it is. He doesn’t need to know. He doesn't need to control how this part of it gets out or how it circulates, and they can deal with the other and far stranger part of it together between the three of them. For now he's kissing Daryl Dixon right in front of _someone,_ and they can watch all they want to.

It's the easiest thing in the world to be shameless when, as it turns out, there's nothing whatsoever to be ashamed of.


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After days of thought and planning, Daryl and Rick finally approach Hershel with the truth. Turns out no plans could ever have been adequate, and it’s harder to ask forgiveness than permission.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Told you I wasn’t done with this (still don’t think I am, there’s more smut I want to write, though this could serve as a very satisfactory ending). I wasn’t sure I’d be able to work with this scenario, but I think it turns out I can. Hope you agree, and please let me know. ❤️ Thanks so much for reading.

“Alright. So let me make sure I've got this straight.”

 _Straight_. Rick wants to laugh a little at the phrasing, and he prevents himself from doing so with every single ounce of strength in his possession. He won't completely ruin this whole thing if he laughs, he's pretty sure, but the prospect of making it even weirder and more difficult than it already is? That's extremely goddamn real.

Because Christ, this is difficult and it is most definitely weird.

When he decided to ask Lori to marry him, he went to her father. Her father was an old-fashioned kind of man, and Rick was inclined to go along with that kind of thing; he was, he supposes with the benefit of much hindsight, inclined in that direction himself. Fine upstanding boy, very concerned with Doing The Right Thing, doing right by this girl he loved—who, if she didn't go to her wedding bed quite a virgin, went there as one in the strictly technical sense and therefore retained her virtue. He cared about that because she did but he also cared because he _cared,_ so before he ever presented her with the ring—though by then she was surely expecting it to be forthcoming—he went to her father and he asked for permission, and was granted it.

This is such a bizarre fucking parody of that, he has no idea how he isn't breaking into peals of crazed laughter. He has no idea how he hasn't been laughing from the word go. He sat down next to Daryl at a table in the corner of the yard on this lovely sunny day, Hershel Greene across from them, and before any of them voiced a single syllable he should have been rolling on the ground clutching his sides until he passed the hell out.

_Yes, well, Mr. Greene, sir, you see what happened is I fingered your youngest daughter in the rain one day a few weeks ago, just shoved it right up her cute little twat, and since then one Daryl Dixon and I have been fucking the shit out of her on the regular. Really laying into her, if you know what I mean, like both ends at once, it's incredible. She takes it like a pro._

_But mostly there's this thing where we've fallen in love with her. And each other._

_Yeah, don't even ask me how that happened. I don't get it either._

_Anyway, I just thought you'd want to know. You okay with that happening? You okay if we keep it up?_

Of course there are things here he wouldn't dream of saying. Of course they've already agreed between them to condense it down to the most important points. Beth isn't actually here; Daryl was explicit about how he would have preferred that she be, but Rick’s instincts told him no and he went with them. Hershel Greene is an old-fashioned man, much as Lori’s father was.

Except perhaps, if they're unbelievably lucky, not in all ways. And with all due respect to Lori’s father, Hershel is probably the best and most fundamentally _decent_ man Rick has ever known.

With perhaps one exception. Not that the exception in question would ever credit the idea.

“Let me make sure I've got this straight,” Hershel says, his voice and his expression both worryingly mild, and he leans back and crosses his arms and nails the truth to the fucking wall.

~

They haven't fucked her since the decision to tell Hershel was made. Haven't literally fucked her, and haven't done much of anything for the last few days over which they've been working out their approach. Also haven't kept their distance, not exactly; the night after his and Daryl’s cat exploded out of the bag, Beth found him alone in his bunk after the block went quiet, crept into his bed and snuggled into his arms. She didn't speak and he didn't expect her to, didn't even really want her to; he circled his arms around her and held her and breathed her in, cheek against the crown of her head. She wasn't naked and neither was he, and while he felt an idle urge to correct that state of affairs, he didn't.

It was enough. It was enough simply to be with her. There was a sweet tightness in his chest that he wholeheartedly welcomed, as if she cradled that very heart in her small cupped hand, squeezing it just enough to remind him of who had it.

The night after, he went to Daryl. There, he felt none of the moral compunction he did with Beth, and in the end they were stripped and tangled up in each other, moaning and shuddering as they spilled hot into each other's hands, slick on their thighs, Daryl’s mouth open against his shoulder and teeth digging into Rick’s skin. Trying to be quiet—but not as much as they once would have.

Everyone knows about them by now. What the hell is there to hide? What judgment is there to fear?

Mostly, as far as he can tell, the general community reaction has been one giant bemused shrug. Stranger things have certainly happened, and strange couplings aren't so strange as they used to be.

After, once their breath was slowing and they had made a cursory attempt to clean themselves up, he lay with his head on Daryl’s chest and Daryl combed his fingers idly through Rick’s hair, and it slammed into him with all the force of a punch how right it felt. Not for anything like the first time, but all the same, all over again, and he turned his head and laid a kiss against Daryl’s nipple, following it with a flick of his tongue and smiling at the resulting shiver.

But then, on to more sobering topics, and he understood then that those topics were why he'd really gone there in the first place. For the pleasure, sure, but the pleasure was a luxury. Something else was a need.

“What're we gonna do,” he asked softly, “if he says no?”

 _If he says no._ As if this is actually about asking for permission, which it can't be. At best it's about asking for forgiveness. They can't walk this back, and it's also not about a question of stopping.

Rick doubts this is the kind of thing you just _stop_.

“If he says he ain't alright with it?” Daryl sighed and his fingers went briefly still. “I dunno.” He rumbled a dry laugh. “That would fuckin’ suck.”

“Yeah.” Yeah, it would suck. It would suck to a degree Rick was and is having difficulty thinking about, though he knows he doesn't have much of a choice _but_ to think about it. It was why he was there in the first place, why he was posing the question, because the possibility is real, and if they weren’t prepared to deal with what comes after…

There is a specific way in which he's frankly terrified Hershel might look at him, if this goes sideways, and go on looking at him in that way, until Rick has to once again leave and go off and make a home for himself in the woods or something, only this time for a whole different set of horrible reasons. How he could possibly be expected to go about his day-to-day, knowing Hershel was looking at him like that.

And knowing, without having to ask, that it would be ten times as bad for Daryl.

Rick would have to go live in the woods. Daryl might dig a hole, jump into it, and bury himself alive.

But then, Daryl was quiet. Thinking, his fingers resuming their steady movements, and Rick let him think. Relieved, for a moment or two, to not have to be consumed by it alone.

“I think…” Daryl sighed and his chest hitched. Upset, already, and trying very hard to not be. Determined to do this no matter what, because it was The Right Thing To Do.

Because this sweet, good girl was worth it.

“I think we let her decide,” he finished. “Whether or not she wants to keep goin’. How to handle it. He’s her dad.”

And it should always be her choice. From the beginning, it had to be her choice. Rick has never had illusions about any of this: he's keenly aware of how much is questionable, of how awful significant portions of his behavior would probably appear to an outside audience, of what a bad man he is for taking such great pleasure in the fantasy of corrupting something so pure and innocent—even if, as it turns out, she's pretty much always been far from _innocence_. It's a fantasy. He's comfortable in that now. If she had ever said no, ever told him to leave her be, ever given him the slightest indication that it wasn't what she wanted… He would have stopped. Immediately, without protest or question.

It has to be her choice. Ultimately, all of it does.

So he nodded, and when Daryl curled Rick’s hair tighter around his fingers and heaved another deep exhalation, Rick wrapped his arm a little more firmly around Daryl’s waist, leg slung over his thighs. He rolled a bit, flaccid dick rubbing against the jut of Daryl’s hip, and for once there was no overt lust in it.

He simply wanted to be close. He wanted it with a fierceness that startled him.

The terrible wound in Daryl’s stomach had still only begun to heal.

“I don't wanna stop this part,” he breathed. “Whatever he says… Me and you. Even if the rest of it doesn't work out, I don't wanna stop. Being with you.”

Daryl made a low noise—not quite a moan, not quite a sigh. Didn't have to say more. It was all in that noise, all the need and raw openness and still more than a little confusion, and despite the confusion it was as clear as _me too._ This didn't need explaining, and in fact it was one thing Rick suspected he wouldn't have to struggle with when it came to laying the whole thing out to Hershel. Hershel would very likely know about it by then anyway, but even if he hadn't: it was merely a fact and could be presented as such.

_I love this man. I want to be with him._

“I love you,” he whispered into the echoing dark, and Daryl stiffened, that hitch once more grabbing his chest, and this time the sound he made was nearly pained.

How many people in his life had ever said that to him? How many? Had anyone? There was a great deal Rick didn't know about Daryl’s life in the world that was, but he believed he knew enough. Could read between the lines. Could read the lines themselves—the cruel scars lashed across Daryl’s skin told a story of their own, and while Rick had hitherto made no obvious study of them, he saw.

Knew implicitly that while temporary insanity had gripped them before and stripped them all in broad rain-tinted daylight, Daryl prefers the dark for this kind of act, with this much of his body exposed.

This act. Lowering his hand and sliding it between Daryl’s legs, closing around his hardening cock and toying with it, enjoying the weight of it in his palm. Gliding over the silky skin, skimming over his balls, up to draw back his foreskin in a long stroke. Daryl’s muscles seemed to uncoil and he fell into a trembling wave, muttering and arching and groping for Rick’s wrist as Rick slowly took him apart.

This wasn't the only way to show Daryl he loved him, couldn't be, but oh, it was such a delicious way. Allowing Daryl to hold his hand steady in the end as he bucked his pelvis upward and fucked Rick’s fist, all slippery with spit and precome, biting Rick’s name in half as his teeth closed on his own lip. If anything, in the weirdest possible sense, there was more innocence here than there had ever been with Beth. The vulnerability in that trembling, in his occasional hesitance, his broken whimpers—that wasn't in any way, shape, or form a pose for Rick’s benefit.

_You have to be careful with him. God, you have to be so careful. You could hurt him so bad._

This wasn't hurting, anyway. Or it was hurting only as he wanted it to, as the thrusts of Daryl’s hips stuttered and lost their rhythm, and he closed his teeth on Daryl’s nipple and ripped a muffled cry out of him, come pulsing over his fingers and Daryl’s belly and glistening in the ghosts of moonlight that managed to penetrate the curtain over the bars.

Rick licked him clean. Daryl couldn't stop shaking. His hands found their way back into Rick’s hair in mindless little clutches.

 _I love you._ Mouthed against the quivering plane of Daryl’s stomach, so close to the gauze covering his wound. _I love you, I love you._

He’ll say it until it doesn't hurt Daryl to hear it anymore, and then he’ll never stop.

~

That part was easy. This part, though.

“Let me make sure I've got this straight,” Hershel says, and looks from one to the other. “You two. And her.”

Four words. _Yep_. He has been so ready for this to be so complicated, but it truly is that gloriously simple. _Us two, and her._ Elementary arithmetic. The kind of equation a small child can do. Dig deeper than that and the complexity remains, no fucking question, but for now the complexity can be set aside.

Hershel doesn't appear to be struggling with it at all.

Daryl clears his throat. Nods.

The day is so deceptively normal. Some distance away, a few of the kids break into a loud and good-natured squabble over the soccer ball they've been kicking against the wall, and Carol calls to them to cut it out or she’ll take it from them. People are laying strips of venison over racks to dry in the sun. Carl is headed toward the pig pen with a bucket of slops. Somewhere, elsewhere, a girl loved by two men is cradling the daughter of one in her arms. Singing, maybe.

Waiting for them. For whatever happens now.

“How long has this been going on?”

Now here's a question he didn't anticipate, and he should have, because in so many ways it's actually one of the most awkward they could reasonably expect to be asked. And it is reasonable. In the few seconds he looks at Daryl sidelong and sees the anxiety flickering in his eyes, he thinks of Judith and what if this was _her,_ and it's something he would want to know. Two men with her, whatever _with_ means, and if they'd been lying to him by omission, he'd want to know just how deep that lie went.

_So fucking stop lying._

“Been. Uh.” He clears his throat. This might be what tips the scales. “A while.”

“Few weeks,” Daryl mumbles, staring down at his hands as he picks at the tabletop, and Rick pushes ahead, half certain that he's only digging them both in deeper.

“We didn't know how to say it. We didn't even know what it was.” _Oh, really? What part of_ we’re fucking your daughter _is too difficult to articulate?_ “Didn't know how serious it was, and then me and him…” He trails off, hopelessly lost. He does indeed have a shovel in his hand and he's busily excavating, like he can dig them all the way to the surface on the other side of the world. Through the heat and the pressure and somehow emerge unscathed.

“We was scared,” Daryl says softly, and now his hands are still and he's looking up, and Rick can only stare at him.

When personal exchanges get difficult, Daryl withdraws, mumbles, won't make eye contact—in short, everything about his aspect until now. Because Daryl is also capable of honesty that would feel to Rick like stripping his own skin off, and when one leaps headfirst into that kind of thing, maybe the sheer abandon affords a courage that isn't available to him at any other time.

This truth is not at all a flattering truth. But it has the great advantage of being true. That has to count for something. Surely.

_We were cowards._

“Scared,” Hershel echoes, and Daryl nods.

“Didn't want to get her into trouble, too.”

Hershel tilts his head. “She didn't tell me, either.”

“She didn't wanna get us into trouble.” Daryl actually smiles, though it's thin and more than a little wan. “She knew how it was gonna look.”

“Mm.” Hershel is quiet for another moment or two. His fingers are tapping lightly on his upper arm. Rick has seen Hershel angry before, knows it can be something that's hard to stand in the face of much less fight through, but this is different. The anger of a father toward his children is always a unique brand of wrath, though it varies every time. He's not even altogether certain that what he's seeing is anger. But it may be, simmering beneath a deceptively placid surface.

Rick sits there, and manages to simply breathe.

“She was right.” The corners of Hershel’s mouth twitch, and that isn't any easier to read than any of the rest of his body language has been. “It doesn't look good. You both know that.” He pauses again, only a beat. “In another time, I suppose you can guess how this would go. It wouldn't be pretty.” Now the twitch is unquestionably a hint of a smile, and that's even more troubling, because the nature of that smile remains impossible to determine. “I might have to get the police involved. Even if she is of age.”

Rick ducks his head, says nothing. _Police_. He grasps the awful humor of this.

“But that time isn't this time. This time…” He exhales, and all at once he both sounds and looks tired. “The part that looks the worst is that you lied to me. You all lied to me.” Without uncrossing his arms, he raises a hand. “Now, I know why you did. You don't need to explain it again. And tell you the truth…”

Silence. A long one. Rick folds his hands in his lap—folds them tight, clasping them around each other so firmly it almost hurts, and that's when he feels the warm, rough weight of Daryl’s closing over his under the table. Thumb stroking over his. And he remembers, and it closes up his throat, as if he's struggling to swallow it down.

_Even if the rest of it doesn't work out, I don't wanna stop. Being with you._

No matter what the state of affairs is once they walk away from the table, this is something he won't lose.

“Tell you the truth,” Hershel says, low, “I can't stop her. You two know that. I can't stop her from doing anything. She's young but she's grown. She can make her choices. She hasn't been a child for a long time now.” Abruptly he leans forward, and in his eyes Rick sees something which, for some reason, he didn't ever expect.

Pain.

“But she's _my child,_ Rick. You have two. You have a _daughter_. If it was her, you'd want to know. Whatever else you thought, you'd want to know about it. Because you love her. Don't you? You love your little girl, more than anything. More than your own life.”

“Yes, sir,” Rick whispers, and his eyes are stinging, and if he cries, good sweet Christ, if he cries over this while the man he loves holds his hand…

Aren't there worse things?

“And you want her to be happy.” Hershel looks from him to Daryl and back again, and that’s no longer pain on his face, or not just. It's as if something behind his eyes has unknotted and gone loose. “Is she?” He takes a breath. “Is my little girl happy?”

The silence that descends is mildly stunned. So many questions he hasn't anticipated, and this might be the greatest of them—and as it sinks into Rick’s mind and Daryl gives his hand a squeeze that doesn't feel entirely conscious, it hits him that this is The Question. This is the question that was always coming, and father to father, knowing everything he knows, he recognizes that ultimately, it's the one that matters.

Daryl will recognize it too. One doesn't need to be a father for that.

Fathers aren't the only people who understand love.

“I dunno,” Daryl says—gravelly, and so astonishly calm. Simple, as so much of him is. “I hope so. Seems that way. But you'd have to ask her.”

“We wanna make her happy.” Rick hasn't the faintest idea where he's scraping together the words from, but the words are there, and he listens to them issuing from his mouth with the same astonishment. “We just… We love her.” He says it, and when he has to battle back the urge to laugh, it's not the same kind of laughter as before. This laughter, he suspects, would feel good. “That's all. We’re sorry, we should've told you, long before. But we love her. We wanna take care of her. We wanna… We wanna give her everything. Everything we can.”

Hershel's eyes flick over, settle on Daryl. Who nods.

“You wouldn't lie about that,” Hershel breathes, and it's not a question. “No. No, I don't believe either of you ever would.”

Another moment, and then he's laying both hands flat on the table, and the set of his mouth tells Rick as clearly as anything could that he doesn't need to hear any more from either of them.

“You're going to prove that to me.” His voice drops, and it's gentle but it's hard. A father’s voice. “You're both going to prove that to me every single day.”

~

Somewhere, elsewhere, around the side of the yard not far from where Rick took her that first rainy day, the girl they both love is indeed cradling his daughter in her arms and singing. This section of the yard is as-yet unused except for grazing by their two goats, and she's walking through a surviving patch of wildflowers, nodding heads all gold and white petals. She's wearing white—a plain sundress, thin straps over her otherwise bare shoulders, even whiter against her tanned skin, and when she hears their boots rustling across the grass she turns and smiles without pausing her song.

So she must see on their faces how it went.

He's thinking of that day when he reaches her. He's thinking of the rain soaking her dress then, the way the fabric stuck to her like a second skin and showed him so much, and he's thinking about the slick heat of her cunt tightening around his finger and her soft little hand tightening around his cock, because of course he is. He couldn't possibly keep those delights out of his mind. But he's also thinking about her _right now,_ the purity of her that has nothing whatsoever to do with any silly fantasy of virginal innocence, and when he pulls her into his arms, his daughter held between them, and presses his lips to her brow, the overwhelming size of what this has become drags his breath away.

Yet he can breathe her in, and she smells like fresh grass and shampoo and sweat, and clean baby. She smells like _home,_ and then a dark shadow of a human form falls across his vision from behind her and joins her scent with smoke and sun-drenched earth, undefinable, a hand on his shoulder and a head bent to his, and she's looking up at the two of them and grinning before her lips brush both of theirs.

She's been held between them before, but never like this, because now he doesn't give a damn who sees. He hopes _everyone_ sees, and that there isn't a doubt in their minds about what it means.

After all, he and Daryl have got some proving to do. Hopefully, if they're spared, years’ worth of it.

Might as well get started.


End file.
